


A Different Kind of Courage

by beng



Series: Fires in the Night [5]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Elven Foresight, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Mirkwood, Stone Sense, Woodland Elf Culture, those two are totally a thing in this series
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2020-08-28
Packaged: 2020-10-10 17:02:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 43,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20531465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beng/pseuds/beng
Summary: Fili, the new King Under the Mountain, and Tauriel, the reclaimed kingdom's new Captain of the Scouts, need to get over the ghost of BotFA and sort things out with Thranduil. Turns out, returning to her original, green home even for a visit is just what the adopted daughter of the Stone needs to accept she can belong to both cultures and to finally heal the wounds left from the Battle and her exile.Recognising that love is just a step away might require from them a different kind of courage than dealing with giant spiders and dark spirits though.





	1. All the Roads of Rhovanion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is not finished, though I may have a more or less finished outline, which is about as far as I've ever managed to go when planning... But it's been a long time that I've been walking around with this story in my head, and... well, I _want_ to start writing it, so let's see how it goes.
> 
> Note: there are references to some casual friends-with-benefits Tauriel/Dwalin happening in the background in the beginning of this fic, but that's not the endgame and not enough to make any potential Tauriel/Dwalin shippers happy, so I'm not tagging it.

“And so the gold rivers of the song have come true,” Tauriel mused as she watched Bard’s men heave the heavy chests from her sturdy dwarven cart pulled by six mountain goats.

Her companion, a wispy, sharp-eyed woman named Algunna, crossed her arms and snorted quietly.

“Have we considered actually rafting the gold down the River Running instead of driving on that terrible road?” she asked.

“We’re considering getting that road fixed,” Tauriel replied. “Durin’s Folk will be coming from the Blue Mountains, returning from the Iron Hills. It wouldn’t do to have Princess Dis break her wagons on the final leg of her journey.”

Algunna nodded, and then went to direct the now empty cart to the yard, to make sure the goats were given some water. Tauriel watched the last pair of men struggle up the wide stairs and into the dilapidated mansion where the old kings of Dale used to live. Yes, spring was coming, and with it would come her king’s people, and most probably a redistribution of duties and responsibilities. But until then — Tauriel remained the Captain of the Scouts, and delivering the Mountain Kingdom’s battle reparations and monthly payments for the scout service that Dale provided was more delight than real duty. Fili, son of Dis, was proving himself a generous and compassionate king, and she was glad to serve him.

At the top of the stair, Tauriel’s gaze passed over the patched roofs of the nearby buildings, barely repaired after the original fire decades ago and the additional damage from the recent battle; over the collapsed walls and the side alleys still overgrown and littered with debris. How different the view before her was from the stories about the proud splendour of Dale... She had heard those stories from eyewitnesses, long before its grandeur become mere memory. The majority of Tauriel’s life had been spent within the borders of Mirkwood, but she had been _there_, walking the hidden paths of her forest, when the dwarves had returned from the Grey Mountains, re-establishing their Kingdom Under the Mountain, and when the city of Dale had been founded. She had been _there_ when numerous caravans on the trade routes had been the norm, when the people of northern Rhovanion had known peace and plenty. And she had been _there_ when Smaug had come.

Mahal, she was old.

“I’ll go see my family then,” Algunna called up to her from the street, interrupting Tauriel’s uncharacteristically morose thoughts. “I’ll be back here in a few hours with the purchases that our scouts requested from the market.”

“Of course. Take your time, Algunna. The days are growing longer. There is no rush.”

Tauriel smiled as she watched the young woman walk down the sunlit street, her limp barely noticeable and head held high. Algunna would make a fine deputy when eventually Dwalin’s own work at the Mountain would make it impossible for him to help Tauriel out on the field.

Speaking of… Tauriel checked the silk scarf wrapped around her neck, before turning to enter the mansion. Lovebites like hers were almost guaranteed to make any Dalish stammer with embarrassment.

But she had nothing to be ashamed of, as far as dwarf and woodland customs were concerned. It was…

Well, she certainly couldn’t complain.

***

“I’m not laying the table in the dining hall, it’s so dusty and large,” Sigrid chattered as she bustled around the kitchen, preparing lunch for her family and their guest.

“There are echoes,” Tilda added with a roll of her eyes.

“And you’re too much of a friend, Lady Tauriel,” Sigrid grinned at her over her shoulder, “to deserve the dining hall.”

The smaller girl scrunched up her face as she paused in counting out spoons. “Hmm. Who _would_ deserve it, Sigi? The Mountain King? But he’s a friend too. He came out of our toilet, remember?”

Sigrid heaved a long-suffering sigh. “But he’s a _king_ now, Tildy. I would say that, yes, King Fili — if he ever graced us with a visit — would get his lunch served in the dining hall.”

Tauriel was sitting in a sunlit niche by the window, quietly enjoying a cup of the first birch sap and the two sisters’ banter. She had barely managed to officially hand over the gold to Bard, getting his signature on the papers Balin always insisted upon, before the new King of Dale had been called away on some urgent business.

She chuckled, “Fili came out of your toilet? I haven't heard that one.”

Tilda sputtered with laughter, and Sigrid waved her ladle at her in exasperation, but then she started laughing too.

“Alright. So it’s a quiet evening—"

"_That_ evening," Tilda interrupted with a meaningful glance.

"Da is out on the lake collecting the empty wine barrels from Mirkwood, I’m darning socks, Tilda-Trout here is making another argument for why we need a dog, when suddenly Bain and Da slip inside, all hushed murmurs and tense glances, throw open the privy door, and out come thirteen soaking wet and none too amused dwarves…”

“It was the only way to smuggle them into the city,” Tilda explained.

Laketown... Tauriel stilled with memory. The wooden town built on piles that was no more, the smell of ash and ruin in the air, the night of terror as she navigated the boat with four dwarves and three children under roaring dragon fire… She was glad the girls could now remember at least something of that night with a smile. But it was not Kili and his runestone that rose to her mind first when she thought back to the desolate grey lakeshore. No, it was the exhausting trek to the Mountain with his brother, despondent and bitter, and miraculously alive, right after the Battle that had a more present place in her memories nowadays.

“And they want _weapons_,” Tilda meanwhile continued. “Real weapons, like swords and shields, but..”

“Armoury,” Sigrid interrupted her, amused disbelief colouring her serious expression even now, almost half a year after the event. “Of course they secretly decide to rob the Laketown armoury, because surely that’s not a dumb idea…”

“It was the stupidest idea,” Tilda shook her head in sad disbelief.

Sigrid tried the steaming hot soup and burned her tongue.

“Mmm. More salt.”

Tauriel watched them moving around the kitchen, passing each other kitchen utensils and dishes, laughing at some jokes that made sense only to them, Sigi and Tilda-Trout, while Bard and Bain were away, busy sorting out the troubles of the surviving Laketowners turned Dalish.

It was love, it was warmth and familiarity, and something clenched in Tauriel’s chest when she thought back to her dwarves, and then further back to her woodland clan. The road to the forest was closed for her. The road to the mountain may also close soon, regardless of her wishes and her King's good intentions.

Tauriel sighed. Life had a way of not turning out the way she had imagined it. So where did that leave her?

***

“South the dwarven gold is going, and east, to the Iron Hills and Dorwinion,” Bard said between spoonfuls of Sigrid’s soup. “West, not so much.”

He looked like he’d aged several years over the winter. His hair seemed greyer in the bright sunshine flooding the kitchen, his shoulders more hunched. It was the doom of mortal life.

“Perhaps it can go west from Dale.” Tauriel swallowed thickly, forcing herself to focus on more present matters. “But no, not west from the Mountain. The Elvenking is still not answering our attempts to negotiate.”

“I haven’t heard anything from him either. Sigrid, would you pass the bread, please.”

Tauriel watched the basket with greyish mixed flour bread travel the length of the table from Sigrid to Bain to Bard. She let it pass without taking any.

“Maybe he’s just busy,” Bain offered.

“Busy with what?” Bard wondered. “And should we be worried?”

“You know you have my King’s support, if it ever comes to that,” Tauriel murmured. Bain’s guess made her uneasy. Thranduil had callously turned away from the Battle of the Five Armies, had exiled her for protesting his policies, had turned his back on the troubles of others. What could he be busy with?

Bard sighed. 

“We can barely get to you,” he said. “That bit of a road is a travesty, both for merchants and for, well, _support_ If it ever comes to that.”

“If you could send some workers, we would pay for our part of the road repairs,” Tauriel mentioned. “We expect some families coming back to Erebor from the Iron Hills in a few months. Durin’s Folk from the Blue Mountains will follow. And your people could use the money.”

Bard shot her a tired glance.

“Not everything can be solved by throwing gold at it, Captain,” he noted. “We don’t have enough people, and those that we have, were born fishermen, not farmers or craftsmen, or road engineers. We need tools, and more food. Clothes.”

“You need roads. The people will come — they are coming already.”

Bard sighed.

“We could do with more money,” he admitted. “I have two more recruits for you. On the same conditions as before.”

Tauriel nodded. She would take the recruits if they turned out smart enough, and loyal. The agreement specified a fair payment to the scouts, and a certain mark-up for Dale. Fili didn’t mind, and if there was anyone who knew the exact specifics of the vast amounts of gold in Erebor, it was him. She smiled to herself.

“Shall I come by later for your response?” Tauriel asked, reminding Bard of Fili’s letter she had brought earlier, together with Balin’s gold delivery certificates.

“About your missing agreement with Mirkwood?” Bard frowned and then glanced out the window as if he could see the dark forest from there. “It’s not for parchment to bear. I’ll come to your Mountain myself next week. I'll bring you those recruits too.”

She didn't think Fili would have any objections. They shortly discussed some other issues, delivery schedules and if any more scouts were needed, how the current ones were doing and when something could be done about the road, and on what conditions. Bard didn’t have any particular secrets from his children, and Bain had to learn these things anyway.

It was a routine visit, after all.

***

Tauriel stretched her arms as she stepped out on the sunlit street once more. Months had passed since her oath at Fili’s crowning, and still it felt strange to think of it as her Mountain, to represent its interests in Dale, to be counted among the Durin's Folk. 

Nevertheless, she was determined to do her best, to serve steadfastly and loyally in accordance with the Law of Durin as it had been taught to her over the winter.

And if everyone did their part, the whole Rhovanion would prosper once again.

Even now, with barely any road or track to speak of, there were families from the Iron Hills writing to Fili, asking about the possibility to return to their ancient homeland, wrapping up their businesses there, and in the stubborn, no-nonsense fashion of the dwarves, girding loins for the hard work ahead of them in Erebor.

Households from the Blue Mountains would be coming too, merchants and craftsmen, a few noble families that didn’t wish to wait for the dryer, safer roads of summer. They would bring a wealth of knowledge and talent to Erebor. They would truly send the promised rivers of gold flowing from the dwarven kingdom.

Tauriel squared her shoulders as she started walking down the street towards the baker's stall at the small market where she usually left the letters home from her Dalish scouts. If nothing else would come from the cultural exchange between Dale and Erebor, at least all her recruits had been taught how to write.

At the market, the sun glinted prettily through a stained glass dragonfly in one of the stalls. Tauriel hesitated in her tracks.

“Excellent work from Dorwinion, my lady.” The merchant had noticed her interest. “Something for the heart, amid other crafts for comfort and function.” He waved at the pans, knives and other practical hardware on his shelves.

She didn’t need it. She lived in a mountain, underground. What purpose could she have for a suncatcher? Her fingers slid gently over the simple ornament. She had seen more exquisite works in Mirkwood and Erebor. But those had been gems, not coloured glass. Nothing as fragile or glimmering, like sunbeams playing in a forest stream. Nothing that exact shade of blue-green.

“How much?” she heard herself asking.

She didn’t need it.

But spring was coming, and what if she wasn’t going to be living in her mountain for long? Princess Dis, or the old noble families might not like her, might not trust her as their Captain of the Scouts, might blame her for the Elvenking’s actions, might find out about the runestone and Kili, and hold that against her too…

And she remembered the old trade routes bristling with activity, remembered heavy barges pulled upstream on the River Running, remembered when the Old Forest Road was not quite as overgrown as it was now. What she had told Bard about roads was not a theory. It was a memory of how wealth and people had flowed in Rhovanion, before the dragon came.

Tauriel glanced down at the glass dragonfly ornament in her hand.

The roads of Rhovanion were free from snow and ice now. The world was open and waiting, if the dwarves ever changed their minds about housing an elf in their mountain.

*** 

“Fili, come down, lad. Leave this kind of work to the others,” Balin pleaded with his young king as he stood in the middle of a market hall, with some parchment in hand. “I have prepared another letter I need you to sign.”

Fili snorted from his perch up on the ledge above the rows of what had once been merchant shops.

“Those letters are useless, Balin.” Legs dangling from the edge, he casually threw his pickaxe in the air and caught it again. Bofur was crouching nearby, busy with his own tools as he continued marking places on the wall that could benefit from reinforcement. The cave-in that had almost cost them their resident elf months ago had taught them a lesson in prioritising structural safety much more.

“Thranduil is not answering letters. Thank Mahal he’s not imprisoning our messengers yet.”

Balin heaved an exasperated sigh.

“We're running out of time, Fili. We _need_ that agreement about safe passage through Mirkwood.”

“We told him that in three or four of our previous letters. It’s obviously not working!”

“Persistence wears down even stone, my grandma used to say,” Bofur chuckled, clapping the dust from his hands and flopping down cross-legged on the narrow ledge next to Fili. “I’m more partial to explosives, gets the job done faster.”

Balin ignored the miner as he spread his hands. “What else is there to do? This is a matter of diplomacy, not force!”

Fili rested his head against the ancient stone behind his back. He knew that. He knew every argument Balin had tried in his letters, and more than a handful of those he had rejected. Their negotiation attempts were hitting a wall.

“Nobody’s suggesting force,” he sighed.

“Then what do you suggest? And come down from up there. You too, Bofur. There must be safer ways to access that wall. Build a scaffold if you must.”

Fili rolled his eyes, while the miner chuckled by his side.

“I could go myself,” Fili suggested. “Like I told you several times already. Bring him those gems he so coveted and see if that gets him in a talking mood.”

“Fili!” The advisor puffed up with indignation, caught between an obvious desire to scold Fili for his idea and not wanting to show disrespect to his king, even if only Bofur was there to witness it. Fili grinned crookedly. Good old Master Balin.

Eventually the older dwarf settled on: “Come down this instant and at least take a look at that letter!”

Fili got the distinct impression that the Mountain rolled her eyes too. She liked solutions, not paperwork. Patting her wall and leaving Bofur to finish the inspection of the market hall, Fili climbed down a long, rickety stair and obediently followed Balin to his office near the archives.

He promised the Mountain that this was the last letter he was going to send to Mirkwood. And he wanted to get it over with quickly, because he knew Tauriel was due to come home soon, and he wanted to talk to her before she left for her scouting base on the northern foothills once again.

Somewhere at the back of his mind, the primordial spirit of the Mountain stretched like a cat after a good, long nap, claws extended and bright eyes ready for action.

Ready for her people to come home.

***

On the way back, it was Algunna driving the cart, with Tauriel sitting beside her, surveying the empty stretch of landscape between Dale and the gate of Erebor. The dragonfly suncatcher was hers, securely packed in straw in a thin wooden box, and she was lazily wondering where she was going to put it in her room. Perhaps it better stay packed for now.

“Captain… I actually meant to ask… If I may,” Algunna spoke up, glancing at Tauriel from under her lashes.

The elf shook herself and smiled at her. “Speak freely. What is it?”

The scout stared ahead for a while, before bracing herself.

“You know my husband died in the dragon’s attack.”

Tauriel nodded.

“He was a good man,” Algunna continued, glancing down at the reins in her hands, “but there was more resignation than love in our union. There hadn’t been many that would consider binding themselves to a lame woman without any great beauty or dowry.”

“You’re a good rider, a good scout,” Tauriel said. “No one would even know you were born with a limp.”

“Geir knows,” Algunna murmured. “And he doesn’t mind.”

Tauriel stared ahead at the bumpy road, thinking over the unasked question about the grim, bearded scout, the brother of Algunna’s late husband. She didn't quite know if it was deemed acceptable for Dalish widows to remarry, or how soon was considered too soon.

“You don’t need any permission from me,” she finally said. “The dwarven and the elven ways are different from the ways of men. But you and your brother-in-law are both in service of Erebor now. So, unless either of you are married, or engaged to be married to someone else… I see no harm done. You can… accept it, or you can keep to the traditions of your own people, it's your decision. The only rule in Erebor for these matters is that duty comes first.”

The scout nodded thoughtfully, and the elf turned her face against the sun again, hand rising absent-mindedly to pull tighter the silk scarf around her neck.

Duty, she thought. Or if you decide to give your heart to someone else.

Mahal, what was it with her and morose thoughts today?

***

Another useless letter signed, his mother's route still unresolved, what a sad failure of a son he was. Fili clenched his teeth as he finally entered his chambers after a long day of structural investigations, surveying the continued inventory efforts, reviewing plans for repairing the internal water supply system... The Mountain cheerfully disagreed, but he was in no mood for arguing with her. Feelings were feelings. They didn't have to make sense, and the most Fili could do for now was to ignore them and hope they'll have faded a bit by next morning.

And to get his mind off those stupid thoughts... His hand reached for the fiddle he had found the night of his coronation. It was cleaned of dust and correctly tuned now, and he was really, _really_ looking forward to planting his sad ass on the mountainside overlooking the road to Dale, and playing something _nice_ under the first blinking stars as he waited for his Captain of the Scouts to come home and report on how things were going in Dale.

He was stopped in the door by Dwalin, looking even more serious than usual, a crumpled letter in his hand and a distraught Balin at his side.

Fili swallowed thickly, a cold lump of dread settling in the pit of his stomach.

"What's wrong?"

"We're not sending this anywhere," Dwalin snarled, throwing the crumpled missive on the floor. "We finally got a message from the Spider King himself."

Fili blinked, momentarily thrown for a loop. "Thranduil, you mean? What kind of message? Who brought it?"

"One of our Dalish scouts. They met a few elves on the southern route and were given this note," Dwalin shoved an abused piece of parchment at Fili. "Thranduil hadn't even deemed it worth bringing to the Mountain proper..."

"He's taken our previous messengers Gloin and Dori, and their two accompanying guards prisoner," Balin muttered before Fili could read the same curt information in the note itself.

"Thranduil has done WHAT now?"

Over Dwalin's shoulder, Fili's eyes locked on Tauriel's. 

Fuck. This was bad.


	2. Laws and Legalities, and Other Words of Power

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, you have NO IDEA what your three kudos for Ch1 did for me, I'm curled around them and staring at them in loving disbelief. It's the relief of parched earth after spring rain. Mahal, I had no idea my previous fic writing endeavour had starved me so bad. "Write for yourself", hah. Works only so far. So here's a huge HUG and THANK YOU to anyone who left me that little heart!!
> 
> *clears throat* Also:  
Reminder that Ravenhill didn't happen in this AU. People died on the regular battlefield, Thranduil still recalled his troops at some point, and he and Tauriel never got that weird reconciliation over Kili's dead body.  
And I don't think that the wife of a King Under the Mountain was titled Queen, but that's just my headcanon.

Fili put the fiddle back on its shelf, closed the door to his adjoining bedchamber, rearranged some torches in the wall sconces, and with slightly shaking hands lit a few candles he then put on the table for good measure. Once everyone had calmed down enough to sit around the table in the small library where the Royal Council meetings were held, he took a deep breath and took a seat too. As fate would have it, all three current members of his Council were present.

“Well,” he started. “Opinions?”

“Opinions?” Dwalin glowered, massive arms crossed over his chest. “Gloin and Dori are imprisoned by that arrogant tree sprite! Have you forgotten his dungeons?”

Everyone except the unapologetically fuming Dwalin shot a glance at Tauriel. The elf was quietly seething.

“It was not that bad a dungeon, we were treated fair enough,” Fili muttered, and threw up his hand before any objections could be voiced. “But,” he turned to Balin, “is this grounds for war?”

The counsellor froze, hands still clutching the little note he had been rereading as if it could reveal some hidden truth.

“War?” His voice was a shaken whisper.

“Haven’t we had enough of that, Fili?” Dwalin wondered bitterly. “Aye, our people are held hostage, and Mahal only knows what else is going on there, but are you really considering it, walking so closely in the footsteps of Thorin Oakenshield and his unfortunate stubbornness?”

Fili shook his head. “That was not my question, Dwalin. What would the Elvenking _expect_ us to do? What does the law of Erebor say?”

“Whatever it says, you were not sworn in on that law.”

Again, all eyes turned to the elf.

“He wasn’t?” Dwalin frowned.

Balin opened his mouth, then shut it again, a frown forming deep between his bushy brows.

“Neither were you, Captain,” Fili countered and then wondered why he’d even said that. Not that it wasn’t true, somehow weirdly it was, but it held no relevance to this situation. Legally speaking. But Tauriel’s tense hazel gaze across the inlaid oak table lit up for a moment, and maybe that was reason enough.

“A king of Durin’s Folk is sworn in upon the Law of Durin,” Balin said slowly. “He is the legislator, with the power to change the laws of his kingdom as necessary to benefit his people, as long as the ancient principles are followed.”

Dwalin grumbled. “What about Grasshopper then?”

“I don’t think Ori made a mistake in his translation of the oath," Tauriel said. "For whatever reason, I obey the Law of Durin.”

Balin brushed a hand over his beard. “It is rare that outsiders pledge their loyalty to the King Under the Mountain. I will have to look into the historical records, see the reasoning behind the wording of this oath.”

Fili shrugged. “Don’t waste your time Balin. The bottom line — what matters at the moment — is that I’m not obliged to act within our existing laws, whatever they would suggest, and therefore we can still try to resolve this peacefully. I’m not keen for war, no.”

Dwalin let his shoulders droop in relief. Balin sighed, and made a note to check the archives anyway. Tauriel was frowning, deep in her own thoughts.

Fili stared at the dancing candle flame. His thoughts were a jumble, skipping from a legal argument to a siege scenario, thinking of infiltrating the Elvenking’s Halls and breaking everyone out in secret — Bilbo had managed to after all — but it still didn’t solve the deeper issue, the missing agreement of passage, and his mother coming across the mountains so shortly, and what if the Elvenking imprisoned her too?

Fili sat up straighter, unconsciously rubbing his chest as if that could make go away the sudden tightness that had lodged behind his heart.

“Then there is only one way,” he said. “What I’ve been saying for months. I take those white jewels Thranduil covets so, and go pay him a visit myself.”

“No, Fili!” Tauriel protested.

“It’s too risky,” Dwalin growled impatiently.

“We cannot anticipate his reaction,” Balin sighed. “I’ve told you _that_ for months too, my lad. And it won’t work if we send a decent number of guards from Dain’s reinforcements with you. He can take it as a hostile gesture. He can attack us or harm the prisoners. Or, he can ignore you completely and pick you off one by one from the trees. Or just let the spiders do the work for him.”

“He does not command the spiders,” Tauriel murmured under her breath.

“Then I take with me only a few,” Fili continued stubbornly. “I take the best.”

Dwalin leaned on his elbows, clutching his head in his hands. “We cannot lose you, lad. We can’t. Don’t make us face your mother alone.”

Balin sighed. “If only we had Bilbo here…”

"Well, we don't."

“Then..." Balin's shoulders sagged in defeat. "Then you must do what’s best for your imprisoned people.”

Tauriel stood up, jaw clenched and something suspiciously wet in her eyes too.

“I will find the jewels and have everything prepared for your departure in the morning.”

Fili nodded mutely as Dwalin and Balin stood, awkward, angry, scared words buzzing in their minds, written on their faces but refusing to be voiced. They knew there was little left to say.

He watched them leave, door closing quietly behind them. He pulled closer the candle with its dancing flame and stared at it for a long while, thinking of Gloin and Dori, and the two warriors that had accompanied them from Dain’s backup regimen that was staying in Erebor after Dain’s main force had gone back to the Iron Hills. He should probably let Dain know about this, and let him know Fili was already doing something about it. Trying to keep the impulsive lord of the Iron Hills in the dark would have worse consequences than having to deal with his stubbornness.

He thought about Dain, his booming voice and iron leg, his strong embrace and genuine relief upon seeing Fili alive after the Battle. He would be an alright king, if it ever came to that. Fili wasn't leaving Erebor without options, should he perish in the cold-hearted Elvenking's woodland realm.

And he thought about his mother, her worried frowns and the dimples in her cheeks when she smiled. Her warmth, her pride, her calloused hands. The weight of everything she had lost already, and what she had to face yet in Erebor. Dis had been informed about Thorin and Kili. But to return to her childhood home, only to find their graves…

Fili blew out the candle and sat in the darkness, the torches having burnt out some time ago.

_Innikh dê_, Kili had promised to return to her, and then never did. Neither did Thorin. Her other brother Frerin, her father and grandfather, all lost in the battle of Azanulbizar. Dis’ mother lost in flames even before that, when the dragon came. Her husband, Fili’s father, lost in an orc attack on a caravan he and Thorin had been guarding. Now it was just the two of them left, a scrap of a family carrying tragedy in their blood.

No, he could not leave her passage to the Elvenking’s mercy.

***

It was her luck that first Thorin and then Fili had already identified and set aside the white jewels of Lasgalen that Thranduil wished returned to him, otherwise Tauriel would have spent a century looking for them in the vast treasury overflowing with gold and precious stones.

As it was, the necklace glimmered brilliantly in her hands, the white gems filling her with a gentle longing and tenderness she didn't know the source of. Perhaps she was turning into a dwarf, understanding the language of stone and metal. Living underground, she had certainly grown to appreciate the soft, comforting darkness of the Mountain.

_Her_ Mountain.

From the grumpy dwarves of Dain’s regimen who stood guarding the treasury and let her pass without a question, used to her being around and used to King Fili trusting her, to Bombur and his kind accommodation of her food preferences, to Bofur’s laughter and Nori’s sly jokes, Ori’s shy friendship, Oin’s patience and Dori’s enchanting tales of what constitutes good wine, even Gloin’s tacit acceptance and the quiet Bifur’s three woodcut boar piglets lining the shelf in her room… And Dwalin. And Balin. And…

“This would have to do,” Balin’s subdued voice came from behind her, and turning she saw the white-haired counsellor holding out a filigree silver box with some velvet padding inside. She gently placed the necklace inside, silent tears running down her cheeks unaccountably.

“I too wish he didn’t go,” Balin said, closing the lid and securing it with a clever mechanism. “But I fear there is no other way to solve this…”

Tauriel brushed a hand over her face impatiently. “It’s not that, Master Balin. I understand. I really do.”

In Fili’s place she wouldn’t have been able to sit idle either. In fact, wasn’t that exactly what she had done, the moment she heard about Kili being injured, about the gang of orcs pursuing them down the Forest River? If anything, Fili was being sensible and responsible, consulting others and waiting for the morning.

“I just wish I could go with them,” Tauriel smiled wanly at the dwarf as they made their exit and turned down a dimly lit hallway.

“It was my understanding, Miss Tauriel, that Fili did intend to take you with him.”

Tauriel shook her head. “I’m banned from the Forest, you all know that. It would not be wise to create more trouble than we are facing already, Master Balin.”

They stopped at a crossing of hallways, upper levels one way and the king’s chambers the other.

Balin frowned.

“Accompanying the King Under the Mountain grants you an immunity that surpasses the Elvenking’s prior ban on you. However, he would have the right to ban you again if, as part of Fili’s retinue, you disrespect his laws, again.”

Tauriel smiled down at him. “The Elvenking does not have patience for ancient laws and details you dwarves have such affinity for. His will _is_ the law of the Woodland Realm.”

At least it was so nowadays. Tauriel had grown up on the tales from times before the Sindar lords, before iron tools and knowledge of Valinor, before the sun and the moon. It had been a long, long time ago when the ancient Greenwood had been governed by a council of Nandor elf clans.

“Miss Tauriel.” Balin glanced up at her, dark eyes shining with new determination. He pressed the filigree silver chest in her hands. “Would you bring this to Fili and _speak_ with him. Beyond what any law says, you _are_ one of our best, and I would dearly like to see the lad return to the Mountain safe and sound. I will take care of the rest of the preparations.”

Stunned, Tauriel watched him shuffle down the hallway, muttering under his breath about ponies and rations and weapons and dry socks.

The priceless jewels of Lasgalen, the heart and pride of the Elvenking, were in her hands, and the weight of Balin’s trust, of all people, made her suddenly week in the knees.

_He_ counted her among their best?

Slowly, she turned and started walking.

***

“Fili.”

In the darkness, he felt more than saw her standing in the doorway, the primordial spirit of the Mountain a warm mantle around her shoulders. None of the dwarves could speak with Erebor, not as clearly as Fili could, and that a woodland elf could even subconsciously comply with her gentle guidance, own her darkness, find her way in the labyrinthine hallways, was nothing short of a miracle already.

“Tauriel.”

She stepped inside the library, placed a small silver box on the table. He didn’t need light to know what it was, to know her thin, slender fingers feeling the knob, prying it open to reveal the pale, starlike shine of white opals set in the purest of mithril.

He reached for the extinguished candle, lit it with practised ease born from long winter nights in his native west. The elf stood by the table, her back tense, her braid a waterfall of fire over her shoulder.

Since when had she started braiding it, and in a dwarven fashion no less?

His glance stopped at the silk scarf around her neck. Since when…? Well, he knew _since when_. She and Dwalin didn’t shout it from the rooftops, but neither did they keep it a secret. That was the dwarven custom with these things.

“Have you already prepared for tomorrow?” he asked instead.

She forced herself to let go of the box, though it seemed she suddenly desperately needed something solid to hold on to. Her hands drew in fists behind her back.

“Master Balin is taking care of that,” she said. “I’m…”

“You _are_ coming.” Fili glanced at her sideways.

“I can’t.”

“Yes, you can. I checked the rulebook.”

Tauriel startled. “I only just now talked with Balin about that. When did you have the time?”

“A week after my coronation.”

Surprised, the elf still shook her head, and Fili sighed. He could mentally see her lowering her head and planting her feet, no less stubborn than any dwarven mountain goat. Where was that ethereal, elven talk of starlight and precious memories? He’d known for a while that their particular woodland specimen was more fire and steel than any Rivendell-style nonsense, although… He narrowed his eyes at her neckerchief once more.

Something about it felt _wrong_, but he'll have to ask her about it later.

“Are you afraid of Thranduil?” he asked instead, and something flashed in Tauriel’s hazel gaze.

“Afraid?” she all but growled. “Fili, I pulled an arrow on him, with every intention to follow through. Back in the camp of the wounded we passed through after the Battle, _you_ had to stop me with a spear at my chest, lest I go and cut his throat. I’ve been exiled from the Woodland Realm for a reason. I _cannot_ go back there.”

Fili paused at the vehemence in her voice.

“So you won’t accompany me to the Elvenking’s Halls because what? Because you believe you won’t be able to control yourself?”

Tauriel broke his gaze, clenched her jaw. “I don’t want to cause you any trouble.”

Fili watched her, fingers trailing an inlaid malachite line on the polished surface of the table, already riddled with missing details nibbled free in the nerve-wrecking weeks after the Battle. Knowing full well the underhandedness of what he was going to say, he took a deep breath and forced himself to lie his palm flat.

“What if I die there?”

Tauriel’s answer was immediate: “You won’t.”

“What makes you so sure?”

Tauriel swallowed tightly, still stubbornly refusing to look him in the eye.

“King Thranduil is… difficult,” she said. “I dislike his manner and his policies. But he’s… He’s not cruel. I have to believe at least that.”

“There are other risks. He can still imprison me. All of us: I’m taking Bofur and Nori with me. I intended to take you too.” Fili steeled himself. “I didn’t expect a refusal, considering you pledged your loyalty to me, and that was not that long ago.”

She looked at him sharply, face pale with shock. Fili hated himself for what he’d just said, but he needed her, both her knowledge of the forest and her skill with weapons, and her staunch support too, because, Mahal’s beard, until now she was the only one who didn’t think he was going to drop dead the moment he entered the forest.

“Take Dwalin. He’s your best warrior,” Tauriel tried to barter, even as he saw her heart breaking over her dilemma.

Fili shook his head. “You're better, and Dwalin stays. Someone has to deal with the Mountain while I’m gone.”

“I can’t go back, Fili,” she whispered her final plead.

“You can,” Fili said, “and you will. Because I need you with me, Tauriel, so leave your scouts with Dwalin for these couple of days, pack your things and be down at the gate in the morning. You’re strong. Stronger than you think. And trust me I’ll stop you if you get any reckless ideas.”

Tauriel closed her eyes, and for a moment Fili feared he had pushed her too far. Oath or no oath, she was not a prisoner. She could walk out and disappear in the vast wilderness of Middle-earth, a broken promise between them the only consequence.

“I will do as you wish,” she finally muttered. “My lord.”

With that she briefly bowed and left.

Alone in the library, with his back to the sealed side door they had recently found hidden behind a shelf — the entrance to the chambers of the last Lady of Erebor none had had the heart to pry open yet — Fili frowned at the dancing candlelight, which suddenly seemed so small, and growing darker.

Even sworn to his service, in private Tauriel had always just called him by name.


	3. Stone is Stone is Stone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THANK YOU to all who read, kudosed or commented!! <3 :)))
> 
> I have a linguistic problem with the mountain goats lol. What they're riding in this chapter is [this animal](https://shots.lotrokin.me/upload/2019/02/03/20190203195809-2cad2ef5.jpg) from LoTR Online. Looks majestic, and large enough for a (shortish) elf to ride comfortably :)
> 
> Also, here's a cool song I found that's full of angst, and epic, and promise at the same time, and works with the theme of this fic _so fine_: [TriORE - Fires Burn, Like Fires Do](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_fXRh39FzM)

The morning dawned bleak and grey, with the threat of a rain gathering slowly from the north. An unpleasant wind whipped the mountainside and the desolate fields below, because sometimes spring could be like that and not act like spring at all. Fili wondered, not for the first time, how different it must have been before Smaug, when pines whispered on the Mountain, when ravens and wrens, and thrushes had a home on her slopes, and fields of rye and flax stretched between Dale and the Lake.

There was a lot he still needed to learn about the nature and the harsher climate of his new home.

When Fili came down to the gate, Nori and Bofur were already there, checking their gear and weapons in grim silence. There had been an argument last night between Fili and Dwalin about who should be coming. Obviously Oin and Ori had wanted to come too, when news reached them about the fate of their brothers, but Oin’s hearing had gone worse during the winter, and little Ori had never been a good enough fighter, in Dwalin’s opinion, to let him join Thorin’s Company in the first place, and Bombur had fallen into the Enchanted River before, and Bifur only talked in Khuzdul and _iglishmêk_, which Tauriel didn’t know that well yet, and… Well, in the end it was Nori and Bofur, and Fili was actually quite happy with that.

Everything was going to turn out alright anyway.

Dwalin and Tauriel appeared soon after, each leading two mountain goats with fierce, forward-pointing horns. The thin sheen of sweat on Durin’s brow implied the two had previously sparred on the rock outcropping as was their custom in all kinds of ungodly hours. Either that, or they’d just fucked, but that was really none of Fili’s business. He swallowed the growl in his chest as he accepted the reins of his mount from Dwalin.

“We have a long day ahead of us, I don’t need my warriors worn out before it’s even begun,” he reproached the older dwarf as Dwalin helped him secure his saddle bags containing the box with the jewels, a leather raincoat, and a sleeping roll, just in case.

“Who, Grasshopper?” Dwalin snorted. “You see a bead of sweat on her?”

Fili glowered at him.

“She’s fine. Pissed off at you, for some reason, but her aim is as true as always, lad.”

“Fili.” Balin, Bifur and Bombur had joined them at the gate, the cousins handing some last-minute provisions to Nori and Bofur, while Balin eyed the young king warily. “Please be careful. Remember all I’ve taught you about the history between our people and where that necklace comes from.”

Fili acknowledged him with a simple nod. He’d actually learned more from Tauriel in one conversation on the mountainside than from Balin in all his years of teaching, at least, on the topic of elves and their history in Middle-earth.

“I’ll be careful,” he promised with a tight smile. “We’ll be back before you know it.”

Tauriel was already in the saddle when Dwalin passed to her something long, wrapped in a raincoat, probably the dwarven longsword she had been training with. They clasped forearms for a moment, and then Dwalin walked off to Balin’s side, arms crossed over his wide chest. Fili sighed and turned towards the elf’s mount, snatching the wrapped weapon from her hands and securing it properly behind her saddle. The stirrups were too long as well — she’d probably used this saddle on a pony before, but this breed of mountain goats, being about the same height, were not that round. Wordlessly, Fili adjusted the straps, imagining he could feel her stubborn angry gaze burn a hole on the top of his head. So she seemed determined not to speak with him.

“Why goats?” he asked her quietly. “Ponies are more sure-footed on soft ground.”

“We ride from Erebor,” Tauriel replied stiffly. “We’re not some pack of adventurers.”

Hmm. She had a point, though not a very pragmatic one. But diplomacy and appearances rarely were.

“And what are you wearing? Aren’t you more comfortable in your elven fashions?”

Tauriel was staring ahead, even as she was holding the reins in a white-knuckled grip while Fili finished adjusting her stirrups. What he meant was the dark blue linen shirt she wore under a light scale mail, wide sleeves of the shirt gathered under slightly modified dwarven vambraces. Over the scale mail, she had put on a dark leather vest trimmed with fur. Her bright hair was still braided in dwarven fashion, and somehow the whole ensemble just didn’t sit right with Fili.

“We ride from Erebor,” she repeated simply.

Fili sighed.

***

The closer they came to the edge of the Forest, the number Tauriel grew under the onslaught of an irrational, paralysing fear that turned her insides and petrified her tongue. The light drizzle that had started a few hours before at least masked the cold sweat of her hands, reminded her she had spent _centuries_ under the open sky, high up in the trees or in guarding posts and in mud when needed. The reminder did nothing to comfort her, when all she desperately wanted was for everyone to turn back, so she could never step foot out of the borders of Erebor and Dale again.

A woodland elf terrified of the Woodland Realm, imagine that.

A woodland elf sworn to the service of the King Under the Mountain! Tauriel set her jaw as she reminded herself why she was here.

Something that Dwalin had asked her before Fili’s first, failed coronation attempt, came to mind. Was she ready to give her life for him, he’d asked. She hadn’t known the answer then.

Staring at the figure in a hooded raincoat riding ahead of her, she thought she knew it now, but, Mahal, why did it have to be _her forest_? She didn’t care much about the Elvenking, should he take her presence as an insult and decide to punish Dori and Gloin, and Fili; she’ll make sure to exact a bloody vengeance against him if it’s the last thing she does; but how could she be expected to raise her daggers against _her kin_?

And even if it didn’t go that far, how could she hold her tongue or her dwarven longsword when faced with the cold-hearted, selfish disregard of the Elvenking?

And even if, Eru willing, everything went fine, how could she be expected to have the strength to leave her forest a second time?

Tauriel brushed a stray tear from her cheek and pretended it was the rain.

It was early evening by the time they made their way through the treacherous marshes north of where the Forest River fell into the Long Lake. Algunna and another scout, young Alarik were accompanying them on horseback, using the opportunity to learn the route through the bog from Tauriel and ready to report back to Erebor the moment they entered the Woodland Realm.

“Let’s stay here for a while,” Tauriel spoke up quietly when they reached the eaves of the forest. “It would be wise to give the Elvenking’s scouts the opportunity to find us, and deliver the message of our coming, before we enter the Woodland Realm.”

“Yeah, I remember he’s not too happy about trespassers,” Fili agreed, dismounting and calling to Bofur and Nori to share around some of the food that didn’t require cooking. Trying to light a fire in this weather would be a waste of time, and possibly another insult to the Elvenking, if they cut any trees looking for firewood.

“I’ve forgotten how it is to ride a whole day,” Bofur chuckled, rubbing his sore bottom and then plopping down on a fallen log.

“Getting soft in the Mountain already, eh?” Nori snorted and rolled his eyes. “I wonder if that’s what happened to Dori. Perhaps the Elvenking considered it a mercy to keep my fussy brother under his roof instead of letting him travel in such weather.”

“Can’t be the case with Gloin though,” Bofur argued. “Gloin’s tough as nails! Could probably arm-wrestle Dwalin.”

“Pfft! No one can arm-wrestle Dwalin.”

“Thorin could,” Fili noted.

“Yes, but I’m talking _now_.” Nori shrugged. “Is there any person in Middle-earth that could in any way bring Dwalin to his knees?”

Fili just smiled at that. He unrolled some of his bedding to avoid sitting on the damp ground and gestured for Tauriel to make herself comfortable. Leaning against an old tree, the elf shook her head. She couldn't force herself to relax, and instead was thinking about what Nori had said, in an attempt to distract herself from the heavy knot of worry growing in her chest.

Tauriel suspected there was indeed such a person in Middle-earth. Probably someone coming from the West, because there was something strange and complicated happening in Old Wolf’s heart lately. She had laid no claims on it, but she also didn’t relish seeing a wistful frown on his face, obviously thinking about another, when he was with her. So recently they had just… stopped. It had left Tauriel with annoying bruises on her neck, the simple fact that no customs or individual agreements had been breached, and a seed of an empty ache planted deep in her heart, because people are still people, as Dwalin would say, and sometimes feel things they shouldn’t.

They were still friends. They sparred, and kept each other company during their guard shifts, and sometimes drank ale in the kitchen. Any misplaced jealousy aside, Tauriel wasn’t sure either of them even missed having something more.

Nori tied their goats to the trees, removed one of the saddle bags and threw it down on Bofur’s lap. The other dwarf took out from it some cheese and bread, broke them in rough chunks and passed around.

“How long will you wait?” Algunna asked, sitting down next to Bofur. Tauriel smiled tightly, watching as the boy Alarik sat on her other side. Huddling close was an almost subconscious habit her scouts had picked up from the dwarves. That, and taking care of each other, strangers though they may have been before joining the service of Erebor.

Fili shrugged from a few paces off where he was busy checking the saddle-bags.

“An hour at most. If nobody shows up, we’ll need those last bits of daylight to go up along the river ourselves.”

And on that narrow path you’ve only seen from the inside of an apple barrel, you’ll be grateful we took goats, not ponies, Tauriel thought, leaning against the tree and watching him rearrange some things between his and Nori’s packs.

She wasn’t hungry. Even if she was, she didn’t think she could get anything down, so instead she just listened to the wind rustling in the dense, darkening trees and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Hearing the familiar signal, she straightened up and squared her shoulders, her hands relaxed, but knowing precisely where the hilts of her daggers were.

Sitting cross-legged on his bedroll next to Nori, Fili removed the pipe from his mouth and tilted his head, listening.

“Is that a barn owl, or a brown owl do you think?”

“It’s the Mirkwood Guard,” drawled a tall, dark-haired elf in green-grey outfit that blended with the gathering twilight. He and his party of five other elves, who were slowly coming out of the trees, all had bows ready in their hands, but they didn’t have arrows trained on them yet. Tauriel knew the situation would change in a heartbeat, if any of the dwarves as much as reached for a weapon.

“Tauriel Denwechiel,” he nodded a cautious greeting at her.

“Hithanar Glamdirion.” The formal name of a guard she had known half her life tasted strange on her tongue, but he had omitted her old title, reminding Tauriel once again that she was not part of the Realm anymore. His eyes shot to hers, for a moment uncertain and perhaps even hurt. Tauriel raised her chin in reserved defiance, and the elf turned his attention to Fili, who had slowly got up from his seat and come forward, hands spread in a gesture of peace.

“You’re the young dwarf king?” Hithanar asked to confirm.

“I am. I’d be happy to add that I’m at your service, but my advisors suggest against making such statements lately. You’re the one they put in charge of guarding the border?”

Hithanar nodded. “I am to bring you to the Elvenking. Will you come willingly?”

“Sure.” Fili grinned up at the archer, and Tauriel was hit with a déjà-vu as she wondered just how many daggers he had hidden on his person this time.

They gathered their few things in record speed, and were back in the saddle in minutes. Algunna and Alarik were allowed to leave freely, choosing to set camp near the lakeshore and return to Erebor in the morning.

It was dark when they reached the Forest River, and almost midnight when their strange, torch-lit procession reached the tall, carved wooden gates of the Halls. Tauriel was tense, and tired, and sad. Every step reminded her of a different time, of her previous life. Even the river gate they passed had the weight of memories attached to it now.

“Tauriel,” Fili called her softly as they were led over the familiar slender bridges towards the Elvenking’s throne room. Tauriel huffed. As if during this whole long day she had let her King out of her sight for even a moment.

His hand lightly brushed against a carved stone pillar that stretched up high, disappearing in the shadows above the hanging bright lanterns and tree roots in the ceiling.

Tauriel’s eyes widened in realisation. Stone. She had never thought about it. The Halls had been carved ages ago by King Oropher into an ancient outcropping of rock that overlooked the Forest River and stretched deep down to the bedrock of Arda. It was part of the same living stone of Rhovanion. The corner of Fili’s mouth quirked slightly upwards when he caught her surprised gaze. He gave her a small nod, kind, deep blue eyes brimming with secret amusement, and a tiny bit of tension bled out of Tauriel.

Until they were led into the throne room and she came face to face with King Thranduil once more.


	4. A Draughty Welcome

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In general, I'll try to update every 1-2 weeks, but between work and studies, we'll see how it goes :)  
Thank you, everyone who's reading! <3  
(The little flowers in the end are totally due to an idea by AquaMoon in "Roots" epilogue comments, hehehe)

Seeing the haughty elf for the first time since the Battle brought up in Fili a wealth of memories, cutting in his heart like shards of glass. Their acquaintance had been indirect at first. It was through the bitter tales Thorin had raised him and Kili on that Fili had come to know Thranduil, and then through the prison under these same halls, through Fili’s frustration at being detained so close to their goal, through his worry about Kili and the missing Bilbo, through his pride warring with annoyance when Thorin had refused Thranduil’s offer.

The moments before the Battle had been the first time Fili had seen the Elvenking, riding on that elk, Bard at his side, and an army at his back. An army Thorin had been ready to go to war with.

Coming up to the base of the throne, Fili waited for their elven guides to shortly report and then fall back. They still hadn’t put away their bows. Fili set his jaw. For better or for worse, he had a responsibility before his people now, and a job to do.

The hardest thing was to push from his mind the bloody, grim memory of the Battle itself, of Tauriel’s soft “I’m banished”, of their shared helpless rage and despair inherent in “I begged him to rejoin the fight, and he didn’t”.

For a long moment they merely watched each other in silence.

“King Thranduil.” Fili nodded in a greeting. He was the guest, after all.

“King Fili, son of Dis," Thranduil returned, lounging carelessly on his throne and looking down on Fili with a cool, unreadable stare. "So the young King Under the Mountain has deemed it necessary to come visit me personally. Should I guess as to the aim of your presence here?”

Fili squared his shoulders and forced himself to not react to the insolence in the elf’s manner.

“There is this matter of passage negotiations,” he started, “but first I’d like to know why you’ve imprisoned my people, who came to you in peace, bringing documents regarding said negotiations.”

Thranduil dismissively waved his ringed hand. “They were in my way.”

“In your way for _what_?” Tauriel quietly snarled behind his back, and Fili saw the Elvenking’s gaze flick to her for a tense moment before he set on ignoring her again.

“My Captain asked a valid question, King Thranduil,” Fili said.

The Elvenking’s gaze bore into Fili’s for another long moment, but this time he refused to back down first.

Thranduil sighed.

“_Your_ Captain is only allowed to stay as long as you take full and complete responsibility for her. Though Valar know it’s just a matter of time or unfortunate circumstance when cracks start developing in her flimsy loyalty.”

“Unfortunate_ circumstance_! Flimsy loyalty? _My_ loyalty is flimsy?!”

Fili shot out a hand, effectively stopping Tauriel as she lunged forward.

“Her trustworthiness is my problem now, King Thranduil. I take the responsibility for her.”

“So be it.” Thranduil sighed again. “It’s late. We shall continue this conversation tomorrow. The guards will show you to your rooms.”

“I want to see my people first.”

Fili would swear the elf lord was suddenly a hair’s breadth from pinching the bridge of his thin long nose and pelting them with whatever selected curses he might find in his language. Somehow managing to retain his unaffected façade, the Elvenking just gestured at the guards.

“Hithanar! Take them to the dungeons. Later, find them some accommodation on the southern side of the Halls. The prisoners stay where they are. Will you be satisfied for now, King of Durin?”

Thranduil gave them a pointed look that dared them to argue further, and Fili took it as the final concession he was going to get tonight. Only then he released Tauriel’s wrist as they turned to follow this Hithanar on the narrow, winding path that led down to the prisons.

It had been a long day, and he was tired. At least Gloin and Dori, and Dain’s two warriors that had accompanied them seemed to be treated decently, and more than happy to see them.

According to Dori, Thranduil had refused to negotiate, or to even read Fili’s, or, more accurately, Balin’s latest letter, and when Gloin and Dori had insisted that the Elvenking should get the Old Forest Road in order, he’d just scoffed and ordered them to return to Erebor. Instead they’d made a turn to go and at least scout the road themselves, as had been Balin’s instruction in view of Princess Dis’ expected crossing of the Misty Mountains, but the forest guards had caught them and locked them up.

That at least somewhat explained the Elvenking’s change of policy regarding his messengers. Apparently, he really, _really_ didn’t like trespassers.

“These two are your rooms,” Hithanar later gestured at the end of a corridor once they were somewhere in the upper halls again. “The beds should be spacious enough, if you don’t mind sharing. We apologise for the inconvenience. We didn’t… Unfortunately, we couldn’t arrange anything more at such short notice.”

Tauriel had grown morose behind him once more, but Nori and Bofur just thanked the elves and ensured them that dwarves had no objections to sleeping in a friendly pile anyway. They paused for a moment by the doors, exchanging a glance with Fili.

“You go ahead,” he assured them with a tired smile. “I just swore to not let my eyes off our Captain here, lest she gets up to some mischief.”

The green wooden door clicked shut behind him and the elf, and he found himself in a cosy, if somewhat empty room with tall, elegant windows cut into the far wall, overlooking what sounded like the forest and the untamed rush of the Forest River. He’d have to wait for the sunrise to appreciate the view.

There was a wide, low bed in the room, a washing table, a small desk, some bare bookshelves. A rocking chair made of some strange, pale wood stood in the corner, flanked with two large carved wood candelabras. 

“I only now realised how dark it is in here,” Fili murmured, retrieving the simple flint and steel from his belt pouch and one by one lighting the candles. “Stone sense has its uses… Come in, Tauriel, don’t stand by the door.”

He paused as something occurred to him. “I mean, you’re not a dwarf, do you mind sharing the room? The bed does look wide enough, and I don’t kick or snore.”

Tauriel slowly shook her head, deep shadows clouding her eyes. “It’s not that. It’s... It’s my old room.”

Someone knocked on the door before he could say anything, and when Tauriel opened, it was that guard Hithanar again, with some of their saddle bags over his shoulder.

“I thought you might want these. What looked like provisions and bedrolls, I left down in the stables. Your friends already took their bags from me, so if anything is missing, ask them.”

Tauriel thanked him in Sindarin, and then something caught in the guard’s voice and he called her outside.

“I’ll behave.” Tauriel sent Fili a sad smile over her shoulder and slipped out.

He could hear them talking in the corridor nearby, but couldn’t make anything of the melodic language. Instead he poured some cool water from the pitcher and washed his face in the simple wooden bowl, checked the contents of their bags to make sure everything was how he’d arranged it back by the edge of the forest. Then he removed his coat and chainmail, kicked off his boots, curled up in the rocking chair and looked around him with new eyes.

So this had been Tauriel’s room.

***

“How are you, Tauriel? You know there are plenty of people asking for you, worried for you, right? Are the dwarves treating you well?”

Tauriel leaned on the ledge of the arched windows on the side of the corridor, strangely reluctant to meet her old companion’s dark gaze directly, and wishing to keep an eye on the door of her room.

“They are. They’ve been good to me, Hithanar. I’m sworn to the King Under the Mountain now. I abide by their laws, and in return they’ve trusted me with a job, with their friendship. I’m not bound to the Mountain, and my work often takes me to Dale. It may not seem much, but in some ways… I don’t know. I’m helping people. After what happened, I don’t know if I could ask for more.”

A line appeared between Hithanar’s brows, but he nodded. “I believe you. Will you be leaving tomorrow?”

“Eru willing, if everything goes well with the negotiations.”

“I’ll make sure to pass your news to your clan. Somehow.”

Tauriel shot him a worried look. “What do you mean, somehow? What’s going on? How are _you_ doing?”

“Without our good Captain of the Guard, you mean?” A spark of humour pulled Hithanar’s lips in a smile.

“I mean… after the Battle. After everything.”

“Well.” The dark-haired elf grew solemn again. “First off, Iorthondir is in charge of the Guard now.”

Tauriel nodded. That was not a bad choice, and she had expected as much.

“Then, Prince Legolas is not here. The King has sent him with some task to Lorien. I’m not sure I should be telling you this, but if you’re here for negotiations, it might crop up anyway, so.” Hithanar shrugged, and Tauriel pretended it was not relief that she felt as she heard the news. Running into Legolas was not something she had been looking forward to.

“You clan is not here either,” her companion continued, crossing his arms over his chest and turning to face the same way out the window. “After the Battle… We lost a lot of people, Tauriel. Masters Aelon and Denwech did not wish to stay confined in the Halls any longer and brought their people back to the forest. Last I heard, they’re working on making the old settlement of Enelgalad habitable again.”

Enelgalad! Tauriel curved her hands around the windowsill in a white-knuckled grasp. Her father had led her people back to her childhood home among the trees?

“And the others?” she asked. “You said many were lost, but… But you withdrew from the battle!”

Hithanar shook his head. “The battle for Dale was a massacre. We can fight in the trees, or in an open field. King Thranduil is a competent leader, with a lot of experience from the times of Doriath and the Last Alliance. But in those narrow, crooked streets, the orcs and trolls overwhelmed us. I understand you confronted Thranduil right after he had taken in the losses.”

Tauriel didn’t know what to say. The empty, silent Halls, the shortage of staff were just the visible signs of the sorrow that still hung in the air, almost half a year after the Battle. It was small wonder that some of the woodland clans had preferred to return to the forest.

“The night after the Battle, I remember walking over broken, bloody bodies of the dead,” she silently said. “Men and dwarves, and orcs, but no elves. I believe, when you say there had been heavy losses in Dale. But the rest of the battlefield was drenched with the blood of the mortal races.”

“I am sorry for what happened,” Hithanar said.

“I’m sorry too.”

It was past three in the morning when she finally returned, the familiar door shutting soundlessly behind her. The candles were still burning in the candelabras carved in the form of tree branches hugged by tiny _taurloth_ blossoms, casting the room in a soft glow. Her father had made those candelabras for her mother when Tauriel was born. Fili was sleeping in her rocking chair. Had he been waiting for her?

Somehow she managed to shake him half-awake and help him stumble to the bed. In addition to being a heavy sleeper, the dwarf was just _heavy_. Praise Mahal for designing a race that would be plain _durable_ against anything the dark forces could throw at them, but moving unconscious dwarves around took some serious effort. At least the bed was new, possibly installed there after Thranduil had ordered it be repurposed into a guestroom. Hers had been higher and narrower. Some of her fur covers on the bed and the floor were missing too. Perhaps her family had taken them after she was banished and her other things sent to the Mountain.

Tauriel tucked the blanket around Fili and for the longest time just watched him sleep. His nose and brows twitched as he dreamt, braided moustache with its silver beads moving with a slight quirk of his lips. His breath hitched. She gently brushed a lock of hair from his face. She remembered how she’d found him that night after the Battle, lying half-dead in a pile of the dead. Remembered how their meeting that night had made them turn away from much darker roads they’d intended to tread: Tauriel into exile, and Fili in the footsteps of his brother.

Strange, how, from such dark, bloodied despair, into her life could come someone as kind and bright as him.

Even if he could and did sometimes walk roughshod over people, based on nothing but a hunch that it would all work out in the end.

Tauriel sat up against the headboard and placed her daggers close. This night was not for reminiscing. This night was for making sure Fili survived in the haunted, half-empty halls of the Elvenking.


	5. Negotiations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Story not abandoned, just buried under work and studies, and a sudden realisation that I want so much more out of this plot than what I had planned before.. So this is me updating through a writer's block out of sheer spite :D

Fili woke from the mattress sagging as someone turned on their side, strands of long, ticklish hair sweeping over his face. It was soft, imbued with the earthy scent of having been drenched in the rain. He was warm and comfortable. Safe. Morning sunlight seemed to be shining right on his socked feet sticking out from beneath the blanket. The air felt so fresh as if he'd been sleeping outside. He grinned, still half-asleep, before the reality started seeping in.

Slowly blinking his eyes open, he noticed there really were no glass panes in the windows. The enchantments on the Elvenking's Halls must be strong indeed, to keep out the chill all year long.

He turned carefully, trying not to wake Tauriel. The elf was sound asleep on top of the covers, her side in the shiny scale mail rising and falling with peaceful breaths. A knot of guilt swelled in his chest. She'd been a coiled spring ever since he'd forced her to come here, even sleeping in her armour, while he... He hadn't really talked to her for months, had he? Listening to her reports and discussing Council business, sure, but really _talked_? 

This was the very same thing Dwalin had accused him of, all those months ago before the cave-in. Not talking to her, just assuming, just relying on his hunches.

Gently, Fili touched her hair, escaped from her braid and clasp, spread in a fiery fan behind her back. When had he last seen it shining in the morning light like this? Had he ever, when all their interactions were bound to the Mountain, or a rare moment under the stars?

Well, their escape in the barrels down the Forest River had been a cheery sunlit one. The rapids had sparked so blindingly white.

Fili removed his hand, the grim memory of the pain on his brother's face when he'd been shot passing like a cloud over the bright morning.

As he was sitting up, Tauriel jerked awake, in a few short moments taking in him — the room — the daggers still lying on the far side of the bed. 

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to fall asleep," she muttered, embarrassed, as she sat up and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. Gone was the peace and contentment. It was like watching one of those old Moria puzzle boxes folding up and closing, locking whatever was inside behind an array of intricate mechanisms and locks. There was something brutally efficient and yet almost regrettable in the way she greeted the new day.

Fili smiled crookedly.

"Don't worry," he said. "You’d disarm any unfortunate sods who decided to attack us before they even knew what hit them."

"Still. That was not my point."

Tauriel stood up and walked over to the window. She gathered her hair over her shoulder and combed her fingers through it as she glanced out, checking the weather and the time of the day. 

"It's late," she mused. "But I think it will be a few hours before Thranduil calls on us."

"Huh, so your people love a good lie-in. How do _you_ wake up so quickly?"

"I've been a guard for hundreds of years, Fili. Mirkwood is not a safe place for sleeping."

"Right." Spiders, wargs, orcs, and their bloody Morgul shafts. Whatever monsters the forest hid, she’d seen it all, ten times over. Fili brushed a hand over his eyes, willing his glum mood away. It didn't help that Tauriel seemed as morose as him, refusing to pick up on his feeble attempts at lightening the conversation. Perhaps this was going to be one of those days you just have to wade through.

Fili sighed. "I sometimes forget how old you are."

The elf looked at him strangely over her shoulder, then she pointed at the carved candle holders in the corner.

"Those were made at the time of my birth," she said quietly. "They are six hundred and eighty-nine years old. The flowers depicted on them, _taurloth_, don't grow in Mirkwood anymore.

"The chair," she gestured at the pale wooden rocking chair, "has been bleached by the sun and rain of over two hundred summers as it stood on my mother's balcony back in Enelgalad. When I brought it here, I had a blanket woven by my grandmother to go with it. I had to throw it out a few years ago as it had more holes in it than a shawl of Lorien lace.

"I was born at a time when your people had abandoned Erebor for the Grey Mountains. I was a young guard when the dwarves returned and Dale was established. When Smaug came, I was five hundred and eighteen, an archer with the border patrol. After, I was appointed back to the guard, making it clear that Thranduil valued the security of his realm above loyalty to his allies..." She glanced out the window again.

"Do not make the same mistake with King Thranduil, Fili. Do remember that he is over three thousand years old..."

Fili barely blinked during her tirade. It did boggle the mind a bit — that those candle stands were evidently older than the raven crown of Erebor —, but mostly it just surprised him how, despite all those numbers and dates that, somewhere in the back of his mind, Fili _did_ know, his Captain still managed to sound and act so _young. _Straightforward as a flying arrow and unselfish, and vulnerable somewhere beyond all those efficient puzzle box locks. 

Well, unknown facts about Tauriel were going to start approaching zero, starting now. From this moment, he was going to _talk_ to her. He was going to get to _know_ her on more than just hunches, or he might as well stop lying to himself believing himself to be her friend.

For example, Fili glanced at her candelabras, why hadn't those been sent to Erebor? He'd heard it loud and clear in her voice that those things were important to her. She'd told him before that elves valued memory over material objects, and the plain frailty of it all was probably the reason why, but still. 

"Alright, I'll keep in mind King Thranduil's... vast experience. But can you tell me of Enelgalad? I've never heard of it," he said. "And," he waved at her attempts to smooth her hair, "may I?" 

Tauriel sent him a wry smile, as a ray of morning sun got caught in her locks, and for a perfect moment of burnished copper, Fili forgot to breathe. She belonged here so well, so deeply. In an airy room with tall windows and sunlight playing in her hair, where a forest sighed and murmured around her, where fierce rapids of a river could sing her to sleep and wake her up in the mornings.

"What? Sorry." He had missed her question.

"I said," Tauriel repeated with a rare amused spark in her eyes. "Someone could use a comb too."

Fili smiled, but only shook his head. “I'll do my hair after.”

She gathered some cushions and, facing the door, sat down cross-legged on the floor. Fili copied her pose sitting on the bed behind her. He had a comb in his pack, and Nori had definitely brought one too, but fingers would do just fine this time.

"You are welcome in the Mountain," he said quietly, burying his hands in her silky hair, pulling some strands back from her temples and starting a simple fishtail braid he'd seen some of the guards sporting the day before. "Whatever you wear," he flicked a knuckle against her shoulder clad in the dark blue tunic and scale mail shirt, "or however you braid your hair. You may have been born as the child of the forest, but you shall remain welcome in the Mountain for as long as I have any say in it.”

Tauriel remained silent.

***

The breakfast, when it came eventually — well past the morning and closer to lunch really — was a quick and simple affair, organised in a slightly dusty dining room overlooking the same white-rapid river. The room was probably intended for the senior officers normally inhabiting this wing of the Halls. Hithanar had left for guard duty, and instead they were served by somebody named Feren, who Tauriel, for some reason, seemed to like less than she did that Hithanar bloke.

Earlier, Bofur and Nori had turned up, worried about the late hour. Tauriel had assured them the life in the Halls tended to run on a slightly late schedule. It allowed for more of the activities to take place under the stars, so apparently nobody was complaining. Fili had finished with her braid and had been rewarded with a quiet thanks. Then he'd used the lull in conversation to redo his own braids, while Tauriel had unwrapped her dwarven longsword, climbed out of the window where a narrow ledge ran along the wall, and, remaining within the view of the room, started a sequence of movements designed to train better two-handed control of the heavy weapon in narrow spaces.

(“Well,” Nori had cleared his throat after the dwarves had been watching her for a while. “I, for one, am glad that Missy is on our side this time.”)

Hours later, Thranduil finally received them in his open-walled study, where no sounds from outside could disturb his peace, save for a gurgling underground stream that ran through it, feeding into the Forest River beyond the walls.

Fili wondered just how deep was Thranduil willing to hide. Where was the limit to his self-preservation, to his isolationist policies? Didn’t he care that, to escape the ugliness of the world, he was chucking out all the good things too? How could he prefer these braziers and lanterns to the sunlit freedom of the upper levels?

Thorin Oakenshield, when hiding in the Mountain, had eventually broken the curse on his mind. Did Thranduil suffer a similar affliction?

"Take a seat, King of Durin."

Fili sat at an elegant round table, with Tauriel, Nori and Bofur remaining at his back. A servant poured him and Thranduil some wine.

“I have a proposal for you,” Thranduil started, studying how the candle light was turning the wine in his glass to ruby.

Fili rose an eyebrow. “I’m listening.”

Thranduil shot a quick glance at Fili. “You just sounded like your forebear. Let's hope, for the sake of sanity, that all your similarities end with intonation...

"The proposal is this: you take your people and never set foot in this forest again. That would apply to you personally, and your people.” Thranduil glanced at Tauriel. “Whoever you consider yours.”

“We need passage through Mirkwood.”

“Go around.”

“It takes at least two more months to take the northern route around Mirkwood. Possibly more than three and a half months to take the south route.”

“So adjust your travel plans accordingly.”

Fili stared at the playful glimmer the rushing stream cast on the warm sandstone walls of the study. Thranduil filled up his own cup once more.

“Why?” Fili asked, frowning. He looked up at the Elvenking. “Why not let us pass?”

Thranduil stood and walked over to the edge of the stream, hands clasped behind his back. He looked relaxed — the kind of relaxed when you’re trying just a tad too hard to hide just how tense you are. Fili swirled the wine in his glass, but he had to taste it yet. He heard Bofur shuffling his feet behind his back. Nori was silent.

Tauriel crossed her arms as she spoke up: “Is it the spiders, King Thranduil? Or is it something worse seeping from Dol Guldur?”

Thranduil turned his head, acknowledging he’d heard her.

“All sorts of wretched creatures have come forth in the aftermath of the Battle,” he drawled. “I will not risk any more lives fighting them. Let them starve, or eat one another. The Woodland Realm have paid their dues protecting this land.”

Fili frowned. Paid their dues? When? When they turned their back on his despaired, devastated people fleeing Smaug’s fire? Or more recently, when Thranduil turned his back on the Battle of the Five Armies?

He clenched his jaw, fighting to suppress the rush of anger.

“Give us the information and the right of passage then,” he said. “We’ll sort out the spiders ourselves, or whatever you have lurking there in the dark. It’s our risk we’re willing to take.”

“It’s not a responsibility _I_ am willing to take,” Thranduil said without turning.

Fili growled under his breath.

“Is there anything that could change your mind?”

The elf lord shrugged lightly, returning in leisurely pace to the table.

“We will see in time.”

“There is no time,” Tauriel snarled.

“You mean _you_ don’t have time. The Woodland Realm can wait.”

At this point, Fili was sorely tempted to splash his wine in Thranduil’s pale, haughty face, and only knowing that Tauriel might as well take it as a permission to slit the elf’s throat, kept him in his seat.

“What about those white jewels of yours?” he forced himself to ask. “Do they hold no value for you now? Can I chuck them into the lake? Or will you — this one time — consider a barter for passage?”

Thranduil shot Fili a cold glare. “My decision will not be bought. Nobody sets foot south and east of the Halls.”

“Two clans did,” Tauriel challenged him.

“That is an internal business of this realm,” Thranduil hissed at her, “which you are no longer part of!”

“You’re not part of it either,” Tauriel shot.

“You dare—”

“You and your family were welcomed here! You can be asked to leave—"

“If the clans even think of—”

“Then what?” Tauriel had her hands clenched in fists, eyes blazing in the low, amber light. Fili, still seated, was following every tiniest movement of the elf lord, knowing perfectly where his daggers were, and having already signed to Nori and Bofur to stand down until told otherwise.

“What are you going to do then, King Thranduil?” Tauriel demanded. “Run to Lothlorien? Sail to Valinor? Will you be able to look in the eyes of those who died at the Battle and tell them you turned your back on it?”

Thranduil rapped his fist on the table and barked an order in Sindarin. His eyes were cold and hard as ice. Tauriel opened her mouth to continue arguing, and Fili shot up to get between them even as guards descended into the room.

"HOLD your weapons!" he shouted and could only hope Tauriel would still listen to him. At least Nori and Bofur remembered what 'escalation' meant and what not to do when you're deep inside an adversary's halls; an adversary's who already holds your other friends hostage.

"Fine! Fine, we're going!" Fili glared at the Elvenking before the guards could get their hands on him. "We'll sort this out internally. And then," he shot an angry glance at Tauriel and Thranduil both, "we'll talk again. Because I don't see any rational conclusion to this other than us reaching _some_ kind of agreement."

A muscle jumped in the Elvenking's jaw, but he kept himself still as a statue. 

"Return to your rooms," he finally commanded in clipped tone. "Don't leave unless invited to. We shall... speak. Later."

"Rooms?" Bofur's surprise mirrored Fili's.

"I for one thought we were going to end up in the dungeons," Nori murmured as he and Bofur were dragged through the corridors. Fili and Tauriel were ushered forward in a more dignified manner.

Finally the door slammed shut in their room, and Fili could hear the guards arranging a guard post outside the two bedchambers.

Tauriel growled as she dropped all her weapons in a heap on the floor and kicked them in frustration. Fili sat down in the rocking chair and leaned his forehead on his hands.

"I..." the elf started.

"Yeah."

She fell backwards on the bed and stared up at the ceiling.

"I messed up."

"Quite."

"I wanted to... and then I just..."

"You warned me. That it's going to be messy complicated, you returning to the forest. Facing Thranduil."

"I let you down."

"You did warn me."

Fili sighed as he straightened up and put his head against the back of the chair.

"Something doesn't add up," he murmured. "We should be in prison. _You_ should be, for certain."

Tauriel continued staring in morose, guilty silence up at the ceiling.

The erstwhile Captain of the Guard, deadly and capable. Still, such a high position for a young woodland elf. Exiled, instead of killed, for an open assassination attempt on her king.

The daughter of one of the clan masters. A clan that had recently challenged Thranduil's policy?

Fili walked over and sat cross-legged on the bed beside the elf.

"Tauriel. What is going on here? What is Enelgalad to your people?"


	6. Of Frames and Backdrops

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yooohhoho, Merry Christmas! ^^

Tauriel followed the guards in a daze, all the way wishing the ground would open and swallow her whole. Was she ashamed? She was _mortified_. How little it had required for her to lose control! A few cold phrases from Thranduil, and she had started making political threats. As if she had any right to! By the sea and the stars, how could she have been so stupid, so rash!

The door slammed shut behind her and Fili. She threw her useless blades on the floor and kicked them. The pile clanged pitifully.

“I…” she tried, but remorse choked up her throat.

Immature.

Irresponsible.

“I messed up.” An understatement if she ever heard one.

Even the familiar vaulted ceiling, so light and appeasing, with small leaves and flower vines carved in the sandstone, seemed to be appalled at her. It was so bright. Complete. Finished. Not a mistake in sight.

It was so perfect.

She opened her mouth, trying to explain.

“I just wanted…”

She had wanted to push. Had wanted to help _Fili_ push through those strangling vines of fear that kept the whole place, and its king, in such passive slumber.

The restoration of the Kingdom under the Mountain, sitting on Fili’s council, witnessing how old statutes and procedures were reviewed, argued, discarded or redrafted until a new, more practical version was approved; seeing how, day after day, Dale rose from the ashes… She had forgotten how slowly things changed in the Woodland Realm. How often they refused to change at all.

Tauriel had warned Fili, that much was acknowledged. But what use was it now?

She had let him down.

She had sworn on Durin’s Law to protect the interests of the Mountain Kingdom, and Fili had trusted her, and what she did was let him down because she couldn’t keep her righteous mouth shut and trust him to handle the situation.

Whatever non-choice Fili had presented her with, it had been a mistake, her coming here. A mistake that could cost her dwarves the agreement about the passage through the wood, forcing Fili's mother to spend several more months on a tiresome and dangerous road. Tauriel drew a shaky breath as a dark abyss of guilt opened around her. The elven passage was at least moderately safe. If you travelled in numbers. If you stayed on the path.

Holy Mahal, his _mother_. He'd already lost his whole family, and now, due to her stupidity, his _mother_ faced the warg-infested wastes of the southern Vales of Anduin, the bandits, orcs, wolves, the desolate, waterless Brown Lands, the—

The bed sagged as Fili suddenly plopped down by her side.

He looked at her with no anger at all. Just intense curiosity. A quiet challenge. 

That solid gravitas she had come to associate with Fili.

She didn't understand—

No anger?

How could he be—

Her mounting dread just crashed against his quiet like a gale checked by the ancient oaks of the forest.

Then he asked her the strangest, most non-sequitur question.

“What is Enelgalad to your people?"

Frowning, his hot-headed Captain slowly sat up against the headboard.

“It’s an old settlement a few days south of the Halls. I was born there. Why do you ask?”

“I need to understand what’s going on here,” Fili said, taking her hand in both of his. She looked far more shaken than the recent exchange with Thranduil warranted. “What does it matter that two clans left the Elvenking’s Halls? How many clans are there anyway? How does all this… work?”

The elf glanced away.

“What does it matter, when I just ruined your negotiations?”

Fili chuckled. “Oh, Tauriel. You should’ve heard when Uncle Thorin laid into him.”

“What did he say?”

“It’s not for ladies’ ears.”

Tauriel's lips quirked upwards in that slow smile of hers, and she still hadn't pulled back her hand.

“Fili! What did he say?”

“_Î__sh_… No, you’ll have to ask Balin.”

“You know Master Balin will never tell me, if even you don’t!”

Fili focused his gaze on the wall above the headboard, trying to retain a modicum of seriousness.

“_Î__sh kakhfê ai’d dur-rugnul_,” he enunciated as clearly as he could.

Tauriel winced. She was still learning the language but… Fili assumed she got the gist of it.

“Another eloquent phrase in Khuzdul," Fili continued in a scholarly tone, "one Thorin threw in Thranduil’s face when the elf offered him help in exchange for those same jewels Thranduil threw back in _my_ face not half an hour ago… _Imrid amrâd ursul_.”

“That’s… vicious.”

“That's dwarves. Puts things in perspective, doesn’t it?” Fili grinned at her. “Now chin up. Tell me about the clans.”

Tauriel sighed.

“There are nine woodland clans,” she started. “Some count only a few people nowadays, others still number in hundreds.

“The clans used to rule in Mirkwood, then Greenwood the Great, through a council of elders. Every clan had their own hunting sites, their own settlements. When Lord Oropher came from the West, fleeing the destruction of Beleriand, we gave him and his people sanctuary. They say Oropher was a mighty fighter. Brave and experienced, able to offer to the council the wisdom and skills of the Sindar. Soon enough, with the forest darkening and new threats creeping from the Misty Mountains and the once proud Amon Lanc, the council made Lord Oropher the King of the Woodland Realm.”

"Probably made sense back in the Second Age."

Tauriel pressed her lips in a line. “The opinions differ about King Oropher’s leadership during the War of the Last Alliance. We lost two thirds of our army in the Battle of Dagorlad. Some blame his pride, unwilling to submit to the command of the High King of the Noldor, others say he was right and there had been little hope to begin with.”

“And then Thranduil succeeded him.”

“Yes. There was no formal approval by the council. He just… picked up where his father had left off, saved whoever he could, and later…” Tauriel shrugged. “After the War, the forest was in such deep pain. I understand nobody had much of an opinion why Thranduil _shouldn’t_ be king.”

“And now?”

Tauriel glanced out at the evening shadows growing deeper in the forest across the river.

“I don’t know. I’ve never given much thought to statecraft. I just wanted to clean out those spider nests once and for all, to protect my people. I’m sorry I can’t provide the answers you seek.”

Fili smiled. “You’ve already told me more than Balin ever could. Give me your best guess then. Why did the two clans leave?"

Tauriel sat up, mimicking Fili's posture, and leaned her forehead on her hands, thinking. 

"My clan did not fight in the Battle, that I know for sure. There's only thirty-four of us left," she slowly started. "My father has prohibited it, as did the clan leader before him."

"Your grandfather?''

"No. It's not a hereditary title."

Fili turned it over in his head. "Why are you forbidden from fighting? And what about you being the Captain of the Guard?"

"It... doesn't matter why. Joining the Guard is fine. We just don't march to battle under the Elvenking's banners."

"Sounds like that case with Oropher and the High King of... those other elves."

Tauriel chuckled. "When you put it like that..."

"What does Thranduil say about it?"

"All woodland elves are in agreement, that we and one other small clan, we don't fight. Thranduil can't force us. It's not about pride though. We just... There's really few of us left. And, fine, my clan traces their lineage from Dan." 

Fili shook his head. "Can't say I've heard of the guy. Was he some legendary leader of your people?"

"His name is Lenwë in Quenya, maybe your education didn't skip that at least?"

Fili cheerfully shook his head again. "You want to hear about the house rivalries in all seven of the dwarven kindreds?"

Exasperated, Tauriel glanced up at the ceiling, frowned, and then got up to stick some new candles in the candle holders.

"He was one of the Teleri who set out on the Great Journey from Cuiviénen," she explained. "Years of the Trees. _Many_ years ago."

"So you _are_ an elven princess," Fili grinned, leaning back on his elbows, watching the little flames spring to life under Tauriel's quick fingers. "And I thought Dwalin was just teasing you."

"I'm not a princess," she muttered and tossed him his own flint and steel when she was done. Those must've fallen out as he slept last night. Fili stuffed the tools back in his belt pouch.

"Alright, so you're not a princess."

"No_._ It's not about bloodlines. It's not because we're somehow better than the other clans either." She sat in the rocking chair and watched the shadows dancing on the carved sandstone ceiling. "It's about... memory. About our songs and tales, and dances...

"I grew up on ancient Nandor lullabies, on a drum beat before a hunt, on old tales and superstitions, the scent of rare healing herbs drying in my mother's home in Enelgalad...

"That memory is worth protecting, we think. And we teach and remind it to others too. Master Aelon's clan, the one that left the Halls together with my Danarim... Those clans are separate in name only. Some of the other seven have all but merged too. It's how we carry on."

Fili watched as the warm look disappeared from Tauriel's face, replaced by a shadow of sadness and a downcast gaze. Was she pondering how she was no longer part of that 'we'?

"Why did they leave the security of these walls then?" he asked again, hoping to distract her from her gloomy thoughts.

The elf rocked slowly in her chair, the creaking of the old wood barely audible over the hum of the rushing river outside. Slender fingers tapped a silent staccato on the armrests as she thought.

"The Almarim... Master Aelon's clan might have lost people during the Battle," she ventured. "Hithanar told me there had been heavy losses in Dale."

Fili frowned. Could it be they were missing some information when judging the Elvenking? Fili hadn't known of any such detail, but... Jumbled as that memory was, he had seen all sorts of people lying injured in the camp he and Tauriel had passed through on their way to Erebor right after the Battle. It was not impossible that there had been elven casualties among them.

It was not _impossible_ that the losses had been heavy.

"My people... The woodland elves." Tauriel closed her eyes as she corrected herself this time. "They value life. They value how it continues through the seasons, through life and death, and new beginnings. They celebrate the hunt, but they also celebrate each new dawn. And I think... I think the... maybe the _permanence_ of this place became too much for them to bear. Especially with all this grief hanging in the air."

She tapped her fingers on the armrest, and Fili could just watch, captivated, as the elf stilled, picking at the threads and motives of the forest best known only to her. 

"How do you mean, permanence?" he prompted.

"I mean these Halls." She glanced up at the ceiling again. "Everything here is built to such eternal harmony. It is not not a backdrop to your life. It's the frame trapping you in the canvas. You're part of the picture, and even the carvings stare down at you in displeasure if you try to change anything...

"And when the king mourns his dead and the prince is gone to Lorien, the grief just hangs in the air like poisonous cobwebs, and there is no space for anything new to grow... Does that make sense?"

"Yeah. I think it does."

In fact, it illuminated a few possibilities with perfect clarity. Thinking, Fili walked over to the window.

Tauriel meanwhile poured some water from the pitcher and washed her face. Fili saw her staring at the mirror for a while, then she glanced down and away, picked up her daggers from the floor and joined Fili where he had climbed out to sit on the ledge.

Two things he could gather from this conversation. First, he really shouldn't be making assumptions about where Tauriel did or did not fit in based on how... picturesque she looked in the frame. She didn't need any frames around her. Second — the Elvenking apparently had a problem with change management, and that was a potential start to a productive discussion, if Fili could figure out how to push for that agreement in increments. Hmm. 

The fragrant smoke from his pipe rose peacefully towards the darkening sky. On the western side of the Halls, the sun must have set a while ago already. They sat side by side in comfortable silence, and perhaps the day hadn't been that terrible after all. 


	7. Negotiations II

Fili couldn't sleep. He'd lain still and stared up at the ceiling for hours so as to not disturb Tauriel, who, after lengthy assurances from Hithanar ("Yes, it's me guarding the door tonight. No, I won't let anything happen to you or your friends. No, the Elvenking is not planning anything insidious, you're _safe_!") had finally agreed to remove her armour and sleep like a normal person. Fili rolled his eyes. He suspected that she only agreed so she could keep watch the entire night next time they were out on the road again. 

On a road to where though? Fili had mulled over his previous attempt at negotiations with Thranduil and his discussion with Tauriel for a hundred times already, and the only conclusion he could draw was that it had been bloody stupid and irresponsible of him to not gather this information beforehand. Again — not talking with Tauriel had, indirectly perhaps, — led to mistakes. Fili could only hope that not all was lost. The Elvenking had been willing to continue the talks, hadn't he?

He turned his head, taking in Tauriel's relaxed face shining dimly in the reflected moonlight that pooled on the floor by the window, and something seized in his chest. Even now, amid the deep blue shadows of the night, in a strange kingdom, having witnessed and suffered from his irresponsible hunches, his unpreparedness, she was somehow still here, with him in every sense of the word.

With him.

Mahal, in just five months, they'd been through so much. Kili's injury and then death, and Thorin's death; the Battle, the grief and hopelessness, and loss; the shaky new beginnings as they both tried to rebuild their lives. Pushing and pulling each other along, when the going got too tough and the tomorrow looked too bleak. Hers was an unexpected friendship he'd been blessed with in this entire mess.

Fili turned to stare up at the ceiling again as he clasped his hands across his chest and swallowed past the lump in his throat.

With Kili's death, she'd somehow ended up being his best friend. An elf. His best friend. And when he pondered all the things she _knew_ — about Mirkwood and Dale, and Rhovanion as a whole — all the things she _believed_ in, like courage and kindness, — he nearly reeled with the realization how much they could _do_ together. 

But she was an elf, and what little he suspected of her concerns, that the newcomers from the West and East — old families with undeniable sway and means — might think it best to remove her from her Captain duties, if not from the Mountain itself, it was, well... As much as Fili hated to admit it, in all honesty, it was a valid concern. Thorin's old company's and Dain's tacit acceptance of Tauriel might not be enough to support Fili's decision to let her stay. And even if the largest houses approved of her formally, there was still the risk of accidents or ugly rumours to make sure she left voluntarily. He could put his foot down, he supposed. Punish all dissidents and other such trouble-makers, secure her acceptance with an iron fist, but... That was not the kind of ruler Fili wanted to be.

Damn. You solve one problem, and seven others raise their heads.

So what _did_ he want?

His mother safe in Erebor. Tauriel continuing to lead the scouts and sit on his council. Dwalin... Yeah, that one was complicated. But he wanted his old teacher and friend to find happiness in this new life that they were building, even if Fili was not sure on the specifics of how exactly he preferred Dwalin's future to look. 

And he wanted to be a just king, remembered for his renewal efforts and helping heal the schism between Durin's Folk and the elves. A neutral, working relationship was all he was asking for. Beyond that? What even _could _be beyond that? It'd be a good life if he managed to achieve half of those goals.

Mother would want grandchildren though. Eventually. Fili scrunched up his nose. A family of his own?

No.

Just... no.

Carefully and slowly, he risked getting up and padded noiselessly to the window, hoping the sussurration of the night wind in the trees, the rumbling river, the dappled shadows from the moonlight playing in the evergreens would help chase away the memories of blood and despair. It was better for everyone if he stuck to trying to be a good king for his people.

For a moment, he imagined it — a girl his age or younger, adorned in gold and precious stones, and... her eyes shining bright with optimism, her face devoid of any shadow of loss and hardship, her hands soft and gentle, never having known the weight of a sword or the elegant precision of a bow. Or worse, someone manipulative and cunning going constantly behind his back to secure better position for her own house.

Fili leaned on the windowframe, fighting a lost ache in the marrow of his bones where all his pain and darkness seemed to have taken root. 

No nobleman's daughter would ever understand what he's gone through. And when new calamity struck, and it always did, for his family, she'd perish while cursing his name.

It would be a travesty to bring any children into such a union. It would never work. No, mother could say all she wanted, but his reign shall be the full scope of his legacy, and nothing else.

Just when Fili was contemplating why he was having such morbid thoughts in the middle of the night, when his _real_ problem was possibly losing his mother for good, there came a knock on the door.

In the blink of an eye, Tauriel was up, hair tousled and blouse crumpled, and a dagger was in her hand, pointed in Hithanar's pale face as he cursed and made a hurried step back through the door. He called to her something in Sindarin, but Tauriel relaxed only minutely once she recognized the elf and glanced over her shoulder to ascertain that Fili was well behind her back.

"Frankly, I meant it as a joke when I said you'd kill any intruder before they knew what hit them," Fili said.

Something shifted in Tauriel's gaze as she looked at him again, a new question, a suspicion. Fili shrugged. Whatever was on her mind, she could ask later.

"Forgive me, Hithanar. You just startled me." Tauriel put away the dagger and smoothed down her tunic as the Sinda stepped back in the room, still slightly shaken and with only a glowing lantern in his hand.

"No harm done, Captain." He cleared his throat before addressing Fili. "King Thranduil would like to speak with you. Both of you, actually."

Fili frowned. "What, right now?"

"Yes."

He exchanged a long glance with Tauriel, and nodded when she did. 

"Give us five minutes to get ready then."

***

The meeting space was the same, her erstwhile king's favourite cavern deep under the forest floor, amid sandstone walls and the clear, rushing stream. She had played in there as a child while her father had been busy in some meeting or other with the Elvenking.

There were three chairs at the table this time, and Thranduil was already lounging in one of them, lazily swirling yet another glass of red vine. Tauriel took a deep breath and clenched her fists, vowing to the stars to keep her head this time.

"I trust you've solved that little misunderstanding we had before?" Thranduil started, glancing up at her and Fili. 

"It's solved," Fili replied as he took a seat. Tauriel wordlessly followed his example, sitting in the remaining chair to his right.

Thranduil just raised an eyebrow, but didn't comment further.

"I may have a counter-offer," he announced, leaning back and measuring them both with his cool, hard stare. "If you'll take it."

Fili waved his hand. "We _are_ here to negotiate. What do you have in mind?"

For a long moment, Thranduil just watched Fili, and the dwarf stared right back at him, calm and reserved, and with sandstone floor beneath his heavy boots. Tauriel almost smiled. Hers was the forest, and Fili's was the stone, and perhaps Thranduil should have opted to meet on a guards' platform in the treetops if he wanted to unnerve the King Under the Mountain.

Thranduil blinked, and Tauriel tensed.

"For you, Fili, son of Dis, King of Durin's Folk," he drawled, "I set the following price: for every traveller of Durin's Folk passing through the Realm to settle in your Mountain, you provide my people with a set of armour. For every merchant passing through to Dale or Erebor, or to the Iron Hills, the price is a set of weapons, and I don't care if those merchants are Men or dwarves. Forward those costs to Bard or Dain as you will, but the price shall be yours to pay first."

Tauriel had to remind herself to keep still in her seat. A set of armour for every settler! They were expecting more than a thousand people, maybe even three thousand, over the course of the next few years! And surely Thranduil would want only the best craftsmanship and materials!

"That's... a steep price," Fili said after a long pause.

"That's half of it." Thranduil turned to Tauriel. "You want that passage too, don't you?"

"I..." Tauriel shot a nervous glance at Fili. "We _need_ that passage. The whole region would benefit from the trade."

Thranduil shrugged a shoulder. "Very well. For you, Tauriel Denwechiel, the price is this: my people will ensure the safety of the path once it's cleared. But none of my warriors will help you clear it. Enlist whom you will: dwarves, Men, or your woodland clans. That blood shall be on your hands, not mine."

Tauriel felt all blood drain from her face, right before Fili spoke up.

"About that second part," he said. "I've been talking about this with Dain and Bard. I offered to take that risk yesterday already, to clean the path ourselves."

"Oh, and how long will it take you to marshal your combined forces for this task?"

"It can be done in a couple of weeks. We still have some time."

"My sources say Lady Dis and her company is descending the eastern slopes of the Misty Mountains."

"_What?_" Fili had leaned forward sharply. "_My_ sources say she's still in the area of Rivendell!"

Thranduil swirled the wine in his glass and then drained it in one long gulp. 

"Apparently, your sources travel slower than mine. But my offer stands, as does my price. I'll even extend it to include both the Old Forest Road and the Elven Path, which your company took on your way to Erebor. My conditions are the same for either route, whichever you choose. Go ahead and clean both of them, if you will."

Fili swore under his breath, unseeing eyes watching the bubbling stream as he grasped for a solution. Tauriel clenched her hands in white-knuckled fists on her lap, forcing to keep her mouth shut and wait till she could unleash her outrage behind closed doors. But could they wait? Thranduil had called them in the middle of the night, Erebor and Dale were a full day's ride away, the Iron Hills were a week's travel, even if they managed to send ravens immediately.

Enelgalad was a three-days' ride; two and a half, if pressed. What's more, it was located between the Elven Path and the Mountains of Mirkwood, between the Enchanted River and the edge of the forest. Her ancient home among the trees, the home to all five hundred of Almarim and all thirty-four of Danarim.

"Her clan is not an option," Fili growled, eyes dark and stormy as he looked up at the Elvenking.

Tauriel's heart skipped a beat and then swelled with something warm and tremulous, and short-lived as the Elvenking continued.

"There are other woodland clans besides the Danarim," he said.

"You're right," Tauriel said quietly. "But I have no sway over their clan masters, and my father is not here. You know that, King Thranduil."

"_You_ know I have no interest in the west. My trade is with Dorwinion." Thranduil got to his feet and brushed down the front of his robe.

"Why won't you send your own forces to help?" Fili pressed, his voice rising in anger. "Princess Dis is travelling with her own company of capable fighters. With enough warriors, the spiders and any straggling orcs won't stand a chance. There doesn't have to be any blood spilt!"

Turning towards the stream, Thranduil shook his head. "Destroying the spider nests has always been your Captain's priority, not mine. My forces stand.

"You will want me to patrol the Old Forest Road, or the Elven Path, when for the past few centuries my people have been relocating to the north and east instead," he explained, to Tauriel's surprise. "I won't spread my resources unless I'm well compensated for my efforts, and my people as safe and well-equipped as they can be. Consider it a gesture of my good will that I informed you in a timely manner. Are you taking my offer then, or not?"

Fili gave a bitter laugh. "What choice do we have?"

"To go around?" Tauriel muttered.

Thranduil remained silent, and suddenly Tauriel knew there really was not much they could do.

"I'll try my part," she told Fili and pretended her voice had not wavered. "We'll go to Enelgalad and speak with my father and Master Aelon. And there's the four of us, and four more of our people in the dungeons." She glanced up at Thranduil. "You will free them, won't you?"

"With the first light," Thranduil drawled. "I'll even send a few scouts west to tell Lady Dis to take the closer path, not the Old Forest Road."

Fili clenched his jaw and glared at the Elvenking.

"Then I agree for my part, but it must be a temporary solution, with Erebor having a right to withdraw at any time."

Thranduil nodded curtly. "Subject to a two-months' notice. And subject to an agreed specification that my quartermaster will send to your... whoever you have there in your Mountain."

"They'll need to speak with Dwalin about the armour and the weapons. Yeah, fine, I agree."

Thranduil half-turned, measuring Fili with a sideways glance. 

"And another thing. My agreement is with you personally. Should you... unwisely perish on this endeavour, the entire contract is null and void."

Fili took a deep breath even as his hands curled tightly around the chair's armrests. His voice barely hitched as he chuckled.

"Why does everyone keep thinking I'm going to die in this forest?"

Thranduil cracked a thin smile.

"So we have an agreement." He bowed his head slightly. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have arrangements to make, so my guests may leave at dawn."

Moments later, they were left alone in the torch-lit cavern.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I figured, either Thranduil can keep being difficult (not a great idea in the longterm), or he can try and strike a bargain for what he actually wants, while also testing if Fili might be easier to work with than Thorin was. And maybe Fili should have argued more, but he's still a newbie king, so, yeah, Thranduil got a lot out of that deal.  
  
And I fully acknowledge that there's a lot of staring at each other sleeping going on in this fic/series :P
> 
> _Map of all the roads and settlements:_  



	8. Along Hidden Paths

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author is alive :) and rather happy with this chapter :)
> 
> Edit 23.04.2020: I had to add one more fragment (the last one) to this chapter, as it didn't quite fit with the next one. Sorry for the confusion!

Hithanar had disappeared. Snagging one of the torches from Thranduil's meeting room, Tauriel and Fili briskly walked through the empty halls on their own, each wondering quietly at the implications of what they had agreed to.

"I'm not getting your clan involved," Fili said as they neared their chambers. "You told me your people don't fight, and I respect that. We'll do it ourselves. We dealt with a dragon, we'll deal with whatever's left lurking in the forest."

"Bard dealt with the dragon, and Mirkwood Guard dealt with the spiders," Tauriel argued. 

Fili brushed a hand across his brow and muttered something under his breath.

"Well, we survived stone giants and trolls, and goblins, and your spiders," he said. "Maybe we had help. But we crossed half the world to get here, and that's not a small thing either."

"I've been trying to eradicate those spiders for decades, Fili. The entire Guard tried, and the spiders are still there."

"Because Thranduil didn't allow you to strike at their nests directly, or so you told me."

Tauriel stopped at their companions' door. "What are you suggesting? Do you even know where their nests are?"

Fili glared at her and then threw open the door.

"Bofur, Nori, get up! We have an agreement with King Thranduil, and we leave at dawn!"

The room was as simple and sparsely decorated as hers and Fili's. A large window, hidden behind a heavy curtain, a similar washing table in the corner. The large bed was a nest of blankets, with pillows on both ends of it—it looked like Bofur and Nori had been sleeping head to toe. There were a few chests by the wall, a sconce where Tauriel stuck her torch, and some lanterns, but no tables or chairs.

Ignoring the groggy stares and questions that the two dwarves started shooting at them, Fili tossed his flint and steel to Tauriel, sat cross-legged on the floor and started to remove the playing cards and stacks of small coins from the middle of a rug the two had been using as a game table. When Tauriel finished lighting the candles in the mirrored lanterns hanging on the walls, Fili had already found a crumpled piece of paper and a pencil that he pushed towards her the moment she came over.

"A map, please. With all the main paths and settlements, and spider nests, and enchanted rivers, because no, I don't know where all that stuff is, and we can't go in blind a second time."

After the emotional whirlwind of an hour they had just had, Tauriel had to take a few deep breaths before she could focus on the task at hand. The dwarves, in their crumpled undershirts and pants, and disheveled braids, had meanwhile all plopped down on the rug, listening, commenting and interrupting as Fili told them about the final agreement with the Elvenking.

For decades, no, for _centuries—_ever since the fall of Moria—Thranduil hadn't done anything about the paths leading through Mirkwood. He had let them overgrow and crumble, choosing to remove his people from the growing threat of Dol Guldur towards the Halls instead. 

But now, _this_ was really happening. In less than two full days they had managed to liberate their unfortunate messengers from King Thranduil's cells and to agree on a passage for Princess Dis and any settlers who might choose to follow her. True, the Elvenking's price was high, and who knew how this was going to end even if they did get help from the clans, but there was conviction in Bofur's indignant protests that Princess Dis would be travelling with only the best warriors of the Blue Mountains, there was creativity in Nori's sly question whether Fili could later change 'persons' to 'families' and then blame it on a mistranslation, there was relief in having been listened to, there was clarity and purpose in the simple task Fili had set for her.

There was an opportunity to serve her Mountain and her Forest both.

Chest overflowing with a sudden sense of blessing, Tauriel got down on the floor and started sketching.

*

"So what about those jewels?" Nori asked about an hour later, when Tauriel had explained to them her map and then left to try and get some herbal remedies from the stores. Fili didn't understand the point but had decided to trust her on this, as long as she promised to stay out of the Elvenking's sight.

Still sitting on the floor studying Tauriel's sketch, he now frowned at the other dwarf. Nori was standing by the wash basin and pulling a wet comb through his messy hair.

"What about the jewels?" Fili asked.

"Well, you said Thranduil didn't want them anymore."

Bofur looked up from rummaging through the blankets looking for his other sock, one eyebrow raised in suspicion.

Fili shrugged. "He probably still does, just didn't want me to use them as a bargaining chip."

"So what now? We take that treasure with us? Into this fine forest, crawling with spiders and whatnot?"

Nori's cunning, dark eyes stared back at him in challenge. Fili drew his brows together, pencil tapping at his chin as he considered. He had already taken some precautions with the jewels, but the others didn't necessarily need to know that. It had been just another one of his stupid hunches he didn't quite want to admit to.

"You think we could smuggle them back to Erebor with Dori and the two Dain's men?" he asked.

"Risky." Nori shrugged. "Who's to say they won't be searched upon leaving?"

"You really think the Elvenking would just take those jewels from us, no deal, no nothing?" Bofur asked sceptically.

"Why not? He took our stuff before."

Fili bit his lip, thinking. Nori wasn't wrong, their weapons and other things, including his own knives and Thorin's elven sword, were still with Thranduil. And he didn't seem inclined to return them any time soon. What if... But no. The jewels were safe right where he put them.

"We have an agreement now. I'm willing to take the risk and trust the Elvenking to let us leave freely," he said.

Bofur shook his head, looking somewhat miffed to be of the same opinion as Nori. "King Thrain also thought he had an alliance with Mirkwood," he said. "And you have no agreement with the spiders."

Fili sighed as he got up from the floor and stretched. "Look. Don't tell Balin, but they're just cold stones, and they evidently mean more to Thranduil than they do to us. We got our passage agreement. Perhaps those gems could be useful in bargaining for something else in the future, but right now they're not a priority. The priority is getting our people home safely."

The dawn was close. They had to start packing. Pausing by the door, Fili turned to the room once more. "One thing Erebor often reminds me," he said, battling the dread that still settled in his gut when he talked about what surely looked like madness to others. "Stone can be rebuilt, she says. So, I suppose, jewels can be remade. But lives lost cannot be regained."

With a final instruction to gather their things, Fili opened the door and almost ran into Tauriel as she returned from her expedition, a couple of carved wooden pots clutched in her arms. For a moment, he stared at his hand on her hip as he had stopped her. Alive. Almost warm through her scale armour. Finally, he stepped away and took a shuddering breath as a tension he hadn't even noticed during her absence released from his chest.

"Successful hunt?" he asked her with a crooked grin as they walked the short distance to their room. "The supplies master gave you what you needed?"

"Oh." Tauriel glanced down at him, a secretive smile playing on her lips. "She gave me what I asked."

Fili chuckled, and then they started packing.

*

They had been allowed to leave freely. Thranduil had released the prisoners as promised, with Gloin and Dori immediately volunteering to go with Fili, while the two Dain's soldiers would be sent back to Erebor to return the mountain goats. Well, the goats and themselves, because Fili expected Dain might not be happy about dragging his people into more danger. On the other hand, knowing Dain, he might as well be overjoyed about the possibility for the Iron Hills to be represented in the rescue mission of fair Lady Dis. In the end, Fili had decided to let them volunteer, and so Borg and Dali had joined his company. The goats, with bridles tucked away in the saddle bags and stirrups pulled up beneath the saddle, were released on the river path, with the hope that they'd find their own way home eventually, because, well, they were _mountain_ goats and there was only one of those in the area, and if they were the least bit smart, they would be looking for someone to get the saddles removed.

Tauriel led the way, her step light on the narrow path riddled with gnarled roots and fallen trees. Her flowing hair that had shone like burnished copper in the early sun just a short while ago had turned bleak, almost brown as the forest darkened, draining all colour and light the farther they went from the Elvenking's Halls.

Nobody felt like talking much. Walking right after the elf, Fili thought back to his previous trek through Mirkwood, with Kili and Thorin. How hungry and despaired they had been towards the end, haunted by nightmares and hallucinations, tired from walking and from carrying Bombur, anxious he might never wake after falling into the Enchanted River. The others, walking in a single file behind them, seemed to be lost in similar gloomy thoughts, with Bofur anxiously glancing to the sides and Dori holding his axe in a white-knuckled grasp. Borg was muttering under his breath. Dali was frowning, seemingly trying to burn a hole in the back of Tauriel's head. Fili sighed and brushed a hand over his forehead. The younger of the two soldiers had been just recently sent to Erebor when Gloin had decided to bring him with them to Mirkwood. Of course, he didn't trust the elf.

Tauriel meanwhile... Fili watched her move effortlessly over the uneven forest floor, hand reaching out to caress dark tree trunks as she passed them quietly as a shadow. Wearing metal scale armour, with her own daggers and a dwarven longsword on her back, with her bedroll and a sack of provisions hanging from her slim shoulders, how could she still move so gracefully?

She stopped after a few hours of walking, when the last traces of the path had disappeared from under their feet.

"What now, missy?" Nori called from the middle of their line. His voice died with no echo at all, as if he had talked in a room lined with carpets and heavy tapestries, not a forest.

"Now..." Tauriel glanced up at the thick, dark canopy of leaves, so forbiddingly still and noiseless, and she smiled. "Now we follow the Nandor path." 

*

The forest was healing. It was the earliest spring still, and barely half a year since the Battle, but something had happened since then, something _good_, and the forest was trying, it was trying its damnedest to leak away some of the poison that had permeated its very air. 

Tauriel walked, fighting a tightness in her throat. Her hand brushed over ancient bark, and she felt that fragile life had started pulsing beneath it. Something rustled in the leaves above her head, and were the dark thrushes returning? A few empty cocoons littered the ground here and there, but those didn't belong to the blue butterflies living above the treetops, those were... Tauriel snatched up a few and examined them more closely. Moths. Silver moths that she hadn't seen fluttering around lanterns for _decades_.

The dwarves didn't seem to notice any of it, marching forward with grim determination, and Tauriel had to suppress a chuckle. Not even Fili, with his acute stone sense? Not even he could hear the Forest?

She brushed away the wetness from her eyes and glanced up again, searching for the ancient marks formed into the branches above her, noticing where they bent in unnatural angles or were cut short, with new shoots growing up parallel to the main trunk. It was nothing obvious to a stranger, even if their sight could penetrate the darkness far enough to see them, but they were as clear as signposts to Tauriel of the Danarim, and she was walking her old path to Enelgalad, she was _going home_, she was getting to see _her clan_, and, _ai Eru_, how had she been this fortunate?

*

Fili watched her move around the small camp fire, ladling in her wooden bowl some of the stew Dori had cooked and then tearing in half a bun of elven waybread, offering the other half to Borg, who took it with a grumbled thanks. Surprisingly, the elves had sent them off with decent provisions this time. Or maybe it wasn't that surprising after all. They had been welcomed in Rivendell, and treated decently even when in prison. Elves were not the enemy, Fili reminded himself. They were just... different. Complicated.

She plopped down next to him, heaving a long, pleased sigh as she started to tuck in her supper, then stopped to stare at the bread for a moment.

"I've grown so used to Bombur's bread that even the Elvenking's kitchen cannot compare anymore," she muttered with a chuckle and shook her head. Fili watched her with amused curiosity as he finished his own meal. She looked relaxed in a way he thought he'd never seen her before, and how did that even work—to be so pleased and chuckling and relaxed while strolling through a nightmarish forest?

"Amazing." At her questioning glance, he waved with his spoon at the mute darkness surrounding them outside the small circle of the quietly crackling fire. "All this danger and gloominess, and you're just... laughing. You're happy."

"I missed my forest." Tauriel smiled as she dipped the bread in the stew and bit off a healthy chunk. "And I think..." 

Fili laughed. "You're talking with your mouth full."

Tauriel shot him a smirk as she finished munching. "You must think the dwarven manners have been rubbing off on me? Just you wait, Master Fili. If we continue with this same pace as today, we'll be in Enelgalad just in time for a feast." She scrunched up her nose at him. "One of the old ones. Wild ones."

At her mention of a feast, Dori perked up where he'd been sitting on Fili's other side. "Ooh, what does this feast entail, Lady Tauriel?"

"The coming of the spring," she said simply.

"And food? I remember you said your people are fond of game, unlike those leaf-eaters in Rivendell?"

"Woodelves are hunters, yes."

"And wine? Do you drink wine in your festivals?" The white-haired dwarf grinned as he pestered her.

"I don't think we should be drinking anything," Dali grunted from across the fire. Fili had the impression the young redhead had made himself omit quite a few choice descriptors as well. "We don't know those... people."

Dori bristled at his side, and Fili shook his head, smiling. "Oh, Dali, son of Radli. Tauriel is my Captain of the Scouts, and she's sworn an Oath of Durin. Those 'people' are her kin."

His grin tightened as he pinned Dali with his gaze. "I know you are new to how things work in my kingdom. But they work excellently, so please consider that when you next open your mouth to mistrust or disrespect Captain Tauriel."

"You can always drink water, lad." Gloin clapped Dali on the back, and the brief, heavy pause when everyone had been staring at Fili, shattered in another peel of laughter.

Laughter. In Mirkwood. Who'd have thought. Fili caught Tauriel smiling at him and winked.

"I mean, everything works excellently, except for the still missing internal water supply," he told her under his breath. "So yeah, sounds like fresh water is something he should enjoy while he can."

And she laughed.

_\---Added 23 April---_

The trees had become sparser towards the evening of their second day on the road, even as their slender branches reached further, forming a roof-like canopy that still didn't let through the least bit of daylight. They were also getting impossibly higher, and Fili no longer knew what species they even were.

He also had no idea where they were. There was no path, no footprints or other signs left by previous travelers, no birdsong or rustling of leaves in the wind. For all he knew, they could be walking in circles in this deathly silence. They probably _would_ be walking in circles, if not for their elven guide, who moved through the forest with some inexplicable ease and confidence.

The lanterns that they carried cast little light on the ground. It was enough to make sure they didn’t trip over any roots, but the forest outside the little shivering circles of light seemed all the darker for it. It felt indefinite.

Fili brushed a hand over his brow as he walked tiredly after Tauriel. No, this was not the darkness of ancient dwarven halls, this was a darkness that stretched for miles upon miles, preying on any lights and foolish travelers.

Tauriel expected to reach Enelgalad early afternoon of the following day, and Fili still had no clue how to approach her father. Maybe he should only ask Master Denwech to introduce him to… the other clan leader? Fili huffed, annoyed, as he realized he had forgotten the name. But learning the ancestry and heraldry of all the houses of all seven dwarven kindreds had not been a matter of a few days either. Mahal, it felt like whole centuries ago and so mind-bogglingly far away in the gentle hills of the West…

"Fili? Can I have a word, lad?"

Fili glanced at Gloin as the gruff warrior fell into step with him. Thankful for the distraction, he let Gloin nudge him to the side until everyone passed, and then resumed walking gloomily at the very end of the line.

"So," the elder dwarf murmured. "Might be not my place to say anything. But don't you think you were a bit harsh with the lad? Yesterday by the fire?"

"With Dali?" Fili sighed. "Probably, yeah."

"Dwalin trusts her," Gloin grunted, nodding at the front of the line where the elf’s lantern gently swayed a way above those carried by the dwarves.

"And you don't?"

The warrior frowned. "I trust Dwalin."

Fili nodded. He had never really understood or liked Gloin much, but in the current circumstances he couldn't be too choosy about his fighters. Every axe and sword counted.

Gloin cleared his throat before continuing. "Dali's concerns were not entirely unfounded, you know."

This time Fili just raised an eyebrow, adjusting to his companion’s slightly disjointed speech.

"I've decided to trust _her_," Gloin pointed to the front of the line, "because I've known _Dwalin_ my whole life, and I know I can trust my own cousin’s judgement. But we don't know anything about her people. About these woodland clans. And young Dali was right to voice his concerns. You were harsh with him."

Oh, _they_ admit they don't know anything? Hah. Was Gloin reading Fili's thoughts or just questioning his motives? Saying he should apologize to Dali, a simple soldier, for publicly calling him out on his little bit of disrespect? Not to sound arrogant, but Fili wasn't sure how he could do that and still maintain authority. Thorin rarely apologized to anyone. His speech to Bilbo at the top of the Carrock had been quite singular in that aspect.

"I guess I'm saying," Gloin spoke up again, "that trust takes time. Those others," he waved at their companions, "their trust is born out of habit. It is cheap. _Schmaltzy_. They've seen that lass every day, have eaten with her, sparred with her, dug her out from that cave-in, and got _used_ to her and her pointy ears. Dali hasn't. He needs to see with his own eyes that she can be trusted. So, you have to be patient with people."

Fili nodded wordlessly, and with a conclusive huff, Gloin stalked ahead, falling into step with Dori while Fili remained at the end, feeling a new weight placed on his shoulders.

So, some of his people felt he wasn’t diplomatic and patient enough. _Wonderful_.

But he should've been prepared for this. Gloin stood for some of the more conservative opinions as far as other races were concerned, and Fili guessed he should call himself lucky that at least Dwalin's trust in Tauriel prevented any grumbling among Thorin's old company. But Fili himself evidently didn't have that kind of authority yet. And apparently, he had miscalculated how much of everyone’s friendly attitude towards Tauriel was due to them simply being a rather kind-hearted bunch, and how much was a deeper loyalty.

When the noble families came from the West, how many would share Gloin's opinion? How many could be persuaded to simply leave Tauriel alone long enough that they _got used_ to an elf being around, leading the scouts, sitting on the royal council? If what he said to Dali was considered harsh, then what could he even say to others who would doubt her?

Fili sighed and tiredly rubbed his brow. The pitch-dark, silent forest seemed as much of a disaster waiting to happen as his inefficient attempts at kingship. Which way was right? Which time and tone was right? How far would he even get before his youth and incompetence caught up with him? Fili sighed again.

Nothing to do but put one foot in front of the other and see where it took him.


	9. Enelgalad

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Before you start this, please see the end part of the previous chapter — I had to add one more fragment, because it didn't fit here.

“Hey, missy, are there _lights_ between those trees?”

“Mahal’s beard, Nori, the forest elves live here somewhere, why _wouldn’t_ there be lights?”

“All I'm saying is, it’s a damn relief I’m not the only one seeing them! You remember the things we saw last time? All the things we thought we saw?

"I think you're exaggerating. Again."

"Bofur, you didn’t recognize your own tobacco pouch.”

“Alright, but…"

"And there was a stag? Never saw it myself, but Bilbo said there had been a white stag shining like moonlight. Reckon that was an illusion?”

Fili chuckled as he tuned out the conversation behind him. Tauriel had rushed ahead even before Nori had called out to her, her lantern glimmering in the trees, and all Fili could do was roll his eyes and drag his tired feet after her. They had marched since early morning without stopping and slept very little the two nights before. Two and a half days when pressed, Tauriel had said? Apparently, they had reached Enelgalad right on schedule.

When they caught up with her, the elf stood leaning against one of those impossible sky-high trees, watching as colourful lanterns were being strung among branches in the distant darkness, clear voices and laughter carrying over from among the disperse trees slightly downhill from where she stood. Several fires already burned on the ground, illuminating those few sitting around them. Many more shadowy, tall figures were dashing to and fro with leaf garlands, musical instruments to be tuned and plates piled high with food still to be prepared, heavy jugs pressed to their hips. And closer to the trees, the fires illuminated... stairs. High, high they wound up around the huge trunks, and somewhere between the branches Fili thought he saw what must be platforms, darker rectangles against the dark canopy, with pretty little lanterns swaying from the floors and the railings. 

Tauriel stood motionless, a hand clasped over her mouth.

"Give me that." Fili took the lantern from her unprotesting grasp and prompted her to drop her packs. "Run."

She made a timid step towards the fires, and then another, and then she was gone, dashing down the slope as light as a roe.

The dwarves followed her at a more dignified pace, chuckling at the ruckus that started the moment the elves realized it was their banished redhead they hadn't hoped to see anytime soon. Fili wondered if they had expected to see her at all. How did it work, being immortal? How much time did it take them to truly start missing an absent friend?

Someone in a red dress exclaimed and dropped a pile of cushions she'd been carrying, and another elf dropped some instrument he'd been tinkering with before breaking into a run towards Tauriel. Several others—Fili assumed, friends or maybe extended family— were crowding towards her too.

"_Nana_, _Ada..._" She tried to pull herself together as she disentangled herself from the bone-crushing hug the two elves were giving her and looked around, grinning at what must be familiar faces. "_Mellyn nín_..."

She gestured at the company when they carefully approached the group, and Fili saw her swallow thickly before continuing. "This is Fili, son of Dis. King Under the Mountain."

"Fili, meet my father, Denwech of the Danarim, and my mother, Baralinel."

Mouth suddenly dry and heart thumping in his throat now that he saw her up close, Fili forced himself to bow, because surely one can't go wrong with that when struck speechless. 

"We... we're honoured," Baralinel muttered. She didn't bow or even nod, just stared at him with large eyes the colour of smoky quartz. He hazily heard Denwech say something too.

Fili mentally kicked himself. "The honour is mine, my lady."

Damn. Balin would be appalled at his manners! But surely the old counselor had never faced someone like Tauriel's _mother_, with dark auburn locks falling almost to the ground, face radiant like mithril under full moon, dressed in a ruby-red gown with a silver belt, and looking not a day older than Tauriel herself. How _did_ this immortality work?! Her father, though just as young, looked almost non-descript next to her, tall and thin, with light brown hair swept carelessly over one shoulder, dressed in a silky, embroidered grey tunic and loose, darker grey pants. He had one arm wound tightly around Tauriel's shoulders, and he looked down upon Fili with the kindest eyes in the world.

Fili swallowed thickly, and was thankful to all the Valar when Tauriel softly smiled at him and started presenting the other dwarves.

*

Their hastily arranged accommodations were a big pile of furs and pillows on a simple wooden floor of some shed, but at least the structure stood just three steps above the ground and a bit away from the celebrations planned in the evening, so anyone who didn't wish to participate would be able to sleep undisturbed. And they were invited to participate, truly—at least, according to Tauriel's parents. The other elves seemed rather suspicious and distant, but so far no weapons had been drawn and no veiled or open threats exchanged. 

"I still think we should have hidden those white gems before coming here," Nori muttered as he spread out his bedroll near Fili's. "There is _a lot_ of them and only seven of us."

Fili glanced up from his selected spot by the wall, where he'd been digging through his pack looking for his spare shirt. "Eight, Nori. Tauriel is one of us."

"Yeah, numbers not my thing, but _still_. Those numbers are not in our favour, if they hear we have something their king wants."

Perhaps he had a point. They didn't know where exactly these clans stood with the Elvenking. Fili sat down on his bedroll and cast a look around the shed, watching as the others were settling in, from Bofur heaving a relieved sigh and plopping carelessly down on the furs like a starfish on a beach, to Gloin, Borg and Dali selecting their spots side by side near the door, muttering in their beards and frowning every time they glanced outside. Their elf was off somewhere with her parents, as she should, and apart from Fili and Nori, only she and Bofur knew they had brought the jewels with them from Erebor.

"Alright," Fili agreed quietly. "Let's not bring those things any deeper into the forest but leave them here. Hide them. But first I need to talk to the clan masters."

Nori nodded, and then chuckled under his breath. "If we kick the bucket in these fine woods, the Spiderking'll be _fucked_. Serves him right for—."

"Spiderking?" Fili narrowed his eyes. "Have you been talking with Dwalin?"

"I, uh, apologize." Everyone's heads snapped up at the quiet voice in the doorway. What was Baralinel doing here? Fili took a deep breath, steeling his nerves, and got up on his feet, manners drilled into the marrow of his bones by his own mother what must be centuries ago.

She hesitated for a moment, then put down by the doorway a heavy tray of food. "You can sit on the steps as you eat, or..." She gestured vaguely at the fires.

"Thank you," Fili miraculously found his voice. "Thank you, my lady."

"Yes." She clasped her hands behind her back. "If you would like to wash before... _Nost-na-Lothion_, I will show you where a pool is. It's not really working, but... There is water. If you like."

"_Is she saying we stink? That we're dirty?_" Fili heard Dori mutter to Gloin in Khuzdul. Frowning, Bofur pulled away his scarf and sniffed at his collar.

"Yes, we _would_ like to!" Fili grabbed his spare shirt and stalked out, cuffing Bofur on the head as he passed. "Pardon my asking, but, uh, I thought Tauriel was with you?"

Baralinel glanced down at him, a slight frown marring her smooth face. "She's with my husband. They have a lot to talk about."

Meaning the mother and the daughter didn't? Fili frowned as he and a few others trailed after her. Baralinel shot him another look and shook her head. Fili swore to himself. 

"I'm not reading your mind, Fili, son of Dis," she murmured. "But I do have a gift. Of, hmm. Observation, you may call it in Westron. I've lived many years under the stars. And you are quite... obvious."

Great. _Wonderful_. Fili felt his hands drawing into clammy fists as he tried to keep up with her.

"Don't worry. She'll know where to find me, later. And you came here with my daughter, you are under my personal protection." Fili shot her a dubious look, but for once Baralinel refrained to comment. "You can tell your people to rest peacefully as long as they like. If anyone offends or disturbs you, they will answer to me."

"I thought, umm..."

"Yes, my husband is the leader of the Danarim. But if they offend you, they will answer to me."

With a flash of an unsettling smile that felt alien on such a noble face, but at the same time looked _so much_ like some of Tauriel's feral grins, Baralinel gestured them to go ahead, turned sharply, the long dress swirling around her legs, and disappeared in the trees.

"Seeing all that family resemblance, I wouldn't want to cross her," Nori drawled at Fili's side. 

"She looks nice though. Like some of those maids we saw in Rivendell, no?" Dori stared after her, contemplating. "That velvet dress looks especially nice craftsmanship."

"Figure she's no maid though," Borg growled, and Nori bent in half sniggering, while Dori blinked in confusion.

Fili shook his head, mostly just relieved that she was gone. He still struggled to accept how it could be that a parent looked about the same age as their child. For all he knew, one of those other elves could be Tauriel's grandmother. Or grand-grandmother. Theoretically, he knew elves were eternally young, but seeing it in practice still boggled the mind.

At least the pool on the outskirts of the settlement was nice, if a little decrepit. The stone edges were cracked and crumbling in places, as far as he could see in the amber light of the lantern Baralinel had left them. A long time ago, it had probably been fed by a forest stream, perhaps there had even been a fountain in the middle. The Rivendelves had loved fountains, maybe the woodland elves did too.

Most importantly, it was quiet here. No bustling, pre-celebration liveliness of several hundred woodland elves, no confusing, unnaturally beautiful mothers to dig through his mind and probably find it amusingly lacking. After months spent in the quiet company of the Mountain, after days walking through the deathly silent forest, the busyness of Enelgalad had been a lot to take in. Fili doubted if even Dale had so many people living there at the moment. So many, unnervingly _tall _and _immortal_ people. He knew he tended to forget Tauriel's age sometimes, but he also sometimes forgot that she was a short one, for an elf. Something ugly twisted in his gut as Gloin's comment about cheap trust and growing used to her came to mind, and he scowled.

Shaking his head, he removed his sword and shucked off his chainmail and the dark tunic he had worn since Erebor. The smell of sweat and road was nothing to be proud of, but they had had it rougher on the long route from the Blue Mountains. He had certainly carried more knives back then. He removed his remaining clothes, reminded the others to behave, so this wouldn't turn into a spectacle like the one in Rivendell, and lowered himself into the cool water that smelled slightly of moss and rain.

A quick bath, to make himself presentable, and then he'd try to find the leaders. If they could help, great. If not, then they'd need to make the most of the rest they've been offered, and leave early in the morning.

A twig cracked in the nearby darkness. Fili tensed, pricking his ears, but all he could hear was just the sound of the other dwarves splashing water over their heads, talking in low voices among themselves. Then, a shadow passed over a distant lantern. Whoever had been by the pool, was walking away now.

Well, Fili thought, relaxing against the edge of the pool again. If those woodelves did decide to finish off four unarmed, butt-naked, wet dwarves—despite Baralinel's assurances and after having survived Smaug and the Battle... yeah. Balin would be appalled, and his mother would be _so_ pissed.

*

"He saved my life," Tauriel finished recounting her adventures as she sat curled into her father's side on a low settee in their old living room up in an ancient _galaspenna_ tree. "Fili brought down all those tons of stone and got me out, and has never even mentioned the entire wings of workshops, apartments and warehouses that they lost because of it."

The loremaster hugged her closer as she rested her head on his shoulder. Long, familiar fingers with no rings on them slid smoothly through her hair, and Tauriel let out a shuddering breath and burrowed deeper against him.

"From what you told me, you saved his life first," her father murmured.

"I just patched him up after the Battle. That he survived it is not my merit."

"Sounds like he... values you."

"He values everyone. He's so kindhearted and generous, dad. Dale is flourishing thanks to Fili and King Bard. The Mountain is... changing. Who knows what the newcomers will bring, but one thing I do know: Durin's Folk could not wish for a better king."

Her father's smile was a warm puff of breath against the top of her head. "Sounds like you value him too."

"Of course I do."

"Hmm."

"I should go find them. See if they are alright." Despite the worry she felt, she didn't move, and her father's hand continued gliding through her hair, unknowingly undoing the simple braids Fili had put there before they'd set out in the morning.

"I'm sure they are. Your mother was going to bring them some food and get them to wash."

Tauriel closed her eyes and took a deep, steadying breath as an old ache throbbed in her chest. She remembered the star-struck look on Fili's face when he'd first seen Baralinel. _Everyone_ looked at her mother like that. And if that wasn't bad enough, she always had that unsettling manner about her.

"Mum shouldn't be allowed to talk to people," she muttered. "You know how she is. She thinks she knows everything, and then doesn't hesitate to say so."

"Eh, they'll be alright." 

"Because they're thick-skinned dwarves?"

An amused softness crept in her father's voice. "Because your mother is wonderful. As are you. That's in case someone ever tells you that you two are in any way similar."

"Yes, I've heard that too."

Sighing, Tauriel sat up and smoothed down her hair. "If she sent them washing, I better bring them some towels."

"Stay a bit, I haven't seen you in months. I'll get you those towels shortly."

"Thank you, dad. But I really can't stay much longer, I need to know they're alright."

Especially, after meeting her mum, Tauriel thought to herself. She needed to see Fili. See if... No. Anything, but that dazed look on his face.

"We don't have much in way of provisions," she continued hesitantly as she mentally shook herself. "I'm not even sure they brought any spare clothes, so please tell mum not to be angry if they show up at the feast looking... well, like people who only left Erebor, expecting to be back in a few days, not having to march to a secret city and then deal with all the spiders single-handedly..."

Her father regarded her seriously, a furrow between his light brows. "You said Aelon and I should meet with Fili later, but what is it about? Did those negotiations with Thranduil fail?" 

Yes. No. It was complicated. At least, she hadn't killed the Elvenking, and he hadn't thrown her in prison for showing up in Mirkwood. Tauriel stood up and walked over to the window, hands nervously tucking back under the vambraces the escaped edges of her dark blue sleeves.

"We got the agreement," she said. "It's about passage through Mirkwood for dwarven settlers and any merchant caravans in the future. Thranduil will secure the path, at a hefty cost, but only after we have cleared it out first. 'That blood will not be on my hands' he said."

"Mhm."

"Fili had counted on help from the Iron Hills and from Dale. But somehow Thranduil had received news that... Fili's mother, Princess Dis' company is much closer than expected. We don't have time to go back or to wait for that help. So, King Thranduil proposed..." She grimaced. Demanded, more like. "Proposed that I speak with the clans. Fili knows he has no right to ask. He knows the Danarim don't fight, and we can't ask this of Master Aelon's people either. So, I don't know."

"What does your Fili think?"

Tauriel huffed. "He's not _my Fili_. He's my king. And friend."

"Mhm. Go on."

"So, what he thinks is we should do it ourselves, hoping the poison on Mirkwood has lifted after the Battle of the Five Armies... And I think... Fili, he... He's lost so much already, dad. I don't know what to do, I think he misunderstands the risks, but I cannot just stand by and watch as his mother perishes as well."

"No, you could never just watch and do nothing... Oh, my little Taurloth."

Tauriel turned to the window, swallowing against the tightness in her chest at hearing her childhood nickname. Taurloth... A compromise between her names, and an extinct one at that.

The wooden windowframe had turned grey with age, and she wondered if the vines that curved around it would bloom this spring or not. Perhaps they were dead too, and mum would need to plant new ones on her balcony, impatiently tugging and guiding the new shoots to curve around their home tree once more... 

"Aren't you afraid your young king would die too? What happens then?" The question jolted Tauriel from her reverie.

"He won't. I know he won't."

With a sigh, her father stretched out his long legs, arms resting on the back of the settee, and stared up at the ceiling, which was covered in multiple layers of carvings left by generations upon generations of Danarim. To Tauriel, the ornaments looked primitive and slightly crooked in places, but even so they carried much more love and artistic passion in their lines, compared to the faultless craftsmanship of the Elvenking's Halls.

"Thranduil is in active communication with Rivendell and Lorien ever since the Battle," the loremaster said. He was watching Tauriel with a wondering, almost speculative look in his eyes. "It is possible that it was one of his messengers from Rivendell that spotted Princess Dis' location."

Tauriel scowled, drawing a nail down the windowframe and finding it left a groove in the withered grain. "What are they communicating about?"

"Mainly Dol Guldur, as far as I know."

Now Tauriel turned her full attention to him, shoving away her nostalgic ruminations and sitting down in a chair across from her father. This sounded important.

"What about Dol Guldur?"

"The Necromancer. He's banished."

Tauriel laughed, surprised. "I thought I felt some change in the air as we came here. Who did it?"

"Now, wait." Her father held up his palm and leaned forward, regarding her with a seriousness she was more accustomed to seeing on her mother's face.

"The dark spirit everyone had always believed to be some nebulous and vague 'necromancer', turned out to be the Enemy himself." Tauriel's heart stopped. "Yes, he has returned. And when the White Council found out—" Tauriel blinked, and her father sighed.

"The council of the local powers — I must have told you that a hundred times... Lord Elrond, Lady Galadriel, Mithrandir, and that wizard from Isengard sit on that council. And apparently, they have collectively managed to banish that cursed demon from Dol Guldur. They think it has returned to Mordor, which... not quite our problem, at least for now. Thranduil is quite rightfully angry that he had to find out through Legolas, who he'd sent to Lorien some two months after the Battle with a simple task to renegotiate some trade details."

"This is the Woodland Realm," he continued. "Dol Guldur is our ancient capital. Of course, Thranduil is furious that the White Council didn't think it necessary to inform him."

Still stunned, Tauriel rested her elbows on her knees and massaged her temples as she tried to work through the news. "So there is no more Necromancer in Dol Guldur. And the Necromancer was really Sauron. And King Thranduil is so focused on being upset with our Western neighbours that he can't spare a thought for helping the ones in the East? Giving us some backup for cleaning that route?"

Her father waved his hand. "It's politics. Due to whatever magic they used in that old fortress, any straggling orcs, spiders and wargs have fled it, meaning the western side of the forest has grown even more dangerous, while the eastern side is slowly healing. I can... see Thranduil's point in not wanting to risk his people."

"So you agree with him."

"I didn't say that. We moved back to Enelgalad, to reclaim our lands, did we not? The years we spent in the Halls have been stifling. When the Almarim lost a good hundred fighters under Thranduil's banners during the battle for Dale, Aelon started talking about moving back here. After Thranduil told us about the Necromancer having been banished, well, it felt like the right time to do so."

A hundred fighters, and that had been just the Almarim. Tauriel swallowed thickly as she hugged herself, shoulders curving in grief. Hithanar had been right, the losses had been staggering.

"So you... rebelled?" she tried. "You just left the Halls and came here?"

"I'm afraid it was nothing so dramatic, my little hothead." He shot her a wry smile. "Thranduil didn't like our decision, true. There was a lot of discussions, but in the end he... grudgingly refrained from prohibiting it."

"He washed his hands of you."

"Mmm, there was nothing to imply what you just said. He can't wash his hands of us that simply."

"Right. Because you are not just a small company of dwarves. I understand."

Tauriel pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes as her head spun from all the information. Her father stepped out of the room, which was so familiar and still so strange, changed by decades of abandonment. It was easier to concentrate on the physical details, like the creaking floor and the small table in the corner, which was certainly new, and the worn rug under her feet, smelling of dust and autumn leaves even though her mum must have tried to clean it repeatedly since their return to Enelgalad.

She needed to speak with Fili. She didn't see any solution to their current situation yet, but he definitely needed to know about the Enemy's return and about Dol Guldur. With a determined clench of her jaw, she straightened up in her seat, only to find her father watching her from the doorway, a pile of linen towels in his arms and a strange glint in his green eyes.

"You've changed." He smiled at her wryly. "I still can't believe you're actually talking to me about Thranduil's policies, about the affairs of the realm... Not just running at orcs and spiders with those deadly knives of yours."

Tauriel shrugged sheepishly as she took the towels from him. "I sit on Fili's council now, didn't I tell you?"

"No," he grinned. "No, I think you forgot to mention that. I think there is _a lot_ you forgot to mention about your life in the mountain."

Tauriel blinked. "Who can tell?"

With a wide grin that she hoped masked the sudden rush of blood to her face, she clutched the towels to her chest and fled down the wobbly stairs, her father's laughter echoing behind her.

*

Twenty minutes later, Tauriel stumbled out of the _galaspenna_ grove marking the old outer border of Enelgalad and sat heavily on a pile of stones that once had been the curb of a well, the towels still clutched in her lap.

She'd just wanted... It's not like she'd never...

What a day she was having.

She had seen the majority of them in various stages of undress at some point or another, because the dwarves were loud and raucous and no shrinking violets when it came to bathing in a mountain that still lacked proper plumbing, and they'd decided the best place to put the tub was in the kitchen, with its huge hearth, and one working floor drain, and a door they regularly forgot to close, and she was a big girl, what she hadn't seen with her own two eyes she could imagine well enough.

By the sea and the stars, she had more important things to worry about, like her mother and ancient threats and the possibility of the eastern edge _crawling_ with spiders, but no, a little skin and ink was what she had to lose her wits over?!

Her hands were shaking. She pressed them to her burning cheeks and forced herself to take a deep breath.

To be fair, she had seen more than just a little, and she had liked what she saw, but it wasn't that. It was a word, rising inside her and ringing in her head.

_Mine, _a knowledge whispered to her as sure, as uncontestable as the fact that Fili won't die in this forest.

She'd seen him shirtless before, remembered the Ereborean architraves etched across a cruel scar, knew the raven feathers that looked like knives hugging those strong shoulders, but... When he'd slowly lowered himself into the pool, only the stylized deer antlers could be seen in the low amber light from the lantern.

His hair had grown longer over the winter. Yes, that had to be it, a simple matter of framing and accenting, something that had simply caught her by surprise. She _knew_ it had been her who'd made the drawing, for Dwalin to ink it on Fili's skin. It was her drawing, yes, and she had no issue with that. She had just never seen it finished. And drawing it in Nandor style, so similar to the knotwork decorating every other ceiling in Enelgalad, especially since she'd recently taken to staring at ceilings, had probably been a mistake, or contemplating ceilings was, because the view was now burned in her mind's eye as permanent as the ink on his skin. But it didn't have to mean anything.

_Mine_, a small voice was whispering stubbornly from the corner of her heart where she just knew things, like all elves sometimes did.

Yes, her drawing, so what?!

With a frustrated cry, Tauriel shot up and set off to find some firewood that needed chopping or anything else _useful_ she could do until Fili got back and they could talk about things that _needed_ worrying about, like Sauron and Dol Guldur.

As Dwalin would say, it was just a drawing, _for fuck's sake_.

*

*

*

“Huh. Towels.” Borg waved the lantern at a crumpled pile of white linen gleaming in the darkness ahead.

Fili glanced around, trying to peer through the gloom, hand moving to the hilt of his sword. Someone had almost brought them to the pool but then had fled. What if something had happened?

Nori just shrugged, throwing his freshly washed old shirt over his shoulder. “Bit late, no? Or did they expect us to walk this far with our squeaky-clean asses bared to the evils of the forest?”

Borg frowned. “You figure any of those tree huggers here interested in your ass?”

“Kinky. Who’s to say they’re not?”

“Who’s to say they are?”

“Why are they left here, that’s a better question,” Fili murmured.

Dori muttered something about Nori and Borg being uncultured savages that wouldn’t know quality linen if it bit them in their hairy behinds, picked up the towels, and stalked ahead to their lodging.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Baralinel](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/a2/74/05/a2740504de1ee58c28687b75d249e947.jpg) (minus jewellery, plus more reddish hair) and [her fancy party dress](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/43/32/22/433222aa72a9a16051607692a3f174c1.jpg) :) And here's inspo for [Mr.Denwech](https://i.pinimg.com/564x/cd/6c/a3/cd6ca31904ccb8ad146595008f75535b.jpg). A [close-up](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/b8/d4/32/b8d432805be1246894614c13074d6cb4.jpg) even.  
Regarding Tauriel's mum, I just evilly wanted to see Fili struggling to compute elven immortality, and then she ran off and took on a life of her own.  
You know it's a bad day when Tauriel starts swearing. Comments, thoughts, questions very much welcome :]


	10. It's Nost-na-Lothion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy! ^^

Tauriel had tried to storm through Enelgalad in search of a weapons store, hands itching for a spear and a sparring match. She hadn't got very far—and that’s even assuming the new armoury was where she supposed it would be.

Familiar faces accosted her from all sides. She forced a smile as she waved at a distant cousin on her father’s side and his beaming bride to be. Then some childhood friends wanted to know if it was true that Laketown had burned down completely and how close she had seen the dragon. Her mother’s aunt on the Almarim side of the family congratulated her on being back, ‘among your people and right where you belong, dear’. Tauriel swallowed a groan and just nodded politely. When she started inquiring about what had her so distraught, Tauriel forced another smile and said something about a headache and fled the conversation.

She hid behind a tree, trying to calm her thoughts while her shaky fingers absent-mindedly restored the simple braids she had worn earlier.

This was unfair! She’d never even hoped to return, but then Fili had pressed her, and here she was, among her kin, in Enelgalad, during her favourite festival, and she couldn’t enjoy it? Because of some… some stupid… _knowing, _a stupid _feeling _from seeing her drawing on Fili's back? Where had that even come from? She had been fine this morning!

Her eyes fell on a familiar auburn mane some thirty yards away. Perfect. Someone who _might_ hold some answers, if only she could ever explain them clearly. Her mum was sitting on a low cross-framed chair, idly feeding twigs into a fire above which a large boar was roasting whole. Tauriel set her jaw and emerged from the shadows.

“Mother. So tell me, how does it work? How do you-”

Baralinel shot her a warning look, and Tauriel should have noticed that she was not alone.

“Tauriel! I was just telling Aelon about you.” Her father beamed at her, waving at his other companion, the one person who, in Tauriel’s opinion, was single-handedly responsible for at least _half_ of the tales about the woodland elves being reckless and wild. The fallow-haired hunter narrowed his eyes at her and grinned, surprise briefly softening his proud profile. In response, Tauriel just squared her shoulders. One did not apologize to the Almarim leader for a small thing like bursting into a conversation.

“Well met, Master Aelon.”

“Well met, Tauriel.” He grinned at her. “Sit with us.”

Tauriel sat stiffly in a fur-covered chair between both her parents and clasped her hands in her lap. She would talk with her mother later, but perhaps she should go and get Fili, if this was starting to look like an official meeting. Then again, she was not exactly eager to return to the pool, if that was where he was.

“I believe congratulations are in order,” Aelon politely inquired, his slow, nasally drawl setting her on edge as efficiently as ever. “For pissing off Thranduil, for becoming Captain of the Scouts for that dwarven kingdom...”

“Uh.” Tauriel blinked. “Thank you. Which of the many times I’ve upset King Thranduil do you mean?”

The Alma laughed. “The one where he banished you, and the one where you came back anyway. See, that’s why I’ve always liked you, Denwechiel. Dwarves, however…” He shook his thick braids in disapproval, and, on top of everything else this day had thrown at her, Tauriel felt her hackles rising.

"How have they wronged you, Master Aelon?" she demanded. "Or are you, despite your words, following King Thranduil's lead, unforgiving of the sack of Menegroth, or some even more ancient wrongdoing? The Sindar are not your people, the Dwarves of Nogrod were not the ones of Durin's Folk; even the land of Doriath exists no more."

"What is it to you, Denwechiel?" Aelon inquired. "This Durin's Folk are not your people either."

"They took me in when Thranduil banished me."

Aelon spread his arms. "_I_ could have taken you in. That new king in Dale could have taken you in. There's a skin-changer living near Carrock on Anduin, _he_ could have taken you in. What does it matter, Tauriel, they are just dwarves, they are _mortal_."

"Aelon, I think that's-" Denwech started, but Aelon waved him off, eyes boring into Tauriel's.

"I was wading knee-deep in blood there in Dale. When my hunters fell, they had taken down with them two score of orcs and more. But men, dwarves... What do they matter, what does even my opinion of them matter, when _they_ fall like field flowers cut down by the first frost?"

"It matters," Tauriel spat, "because I've seen how they _change_ things. Not all fights need to be won by blades, though dwarves have fought their fair share in the Battle as well. I've seen Dale risen from rubble in just a few short months now that the dragon is gone, I've seen fear and hunger disappeared from people's faces, I've seen gold distributed fairly! I see statutes rewritten and laws remade when they no longer serve the needs of the people. Meanwhile nothing would have changed in Mirkwood, had thirteen dwarves not come traipsing through! We Eldar could learn a thing or two from those we look down upon for their lifespan."

The Alma leaned back in his chair, jaw clenched and hands clasped tightly around the arm rests, but a thoughtful look on his face. Tauriel let out a deep breath, stunned at her own daring. She had never argued with any of the clan leaders like this, but it appeared that Aelon had at least heard her.

“Tauriel is right. The return of the dwarves has sprouted many a seed, my friend,” her father said after a while, gazing calmly at their slowly roasting dinner.

“Many an empty seat by the table it has brought to the Almarim.”

“Courage it has brought us too,” Baralinel spoke up quietly. “Courage to take back what is ours, _our_ deep roots remaining untouched by the frost.”

After a long pause, the Alma nodded.

Her father gave Tauriel a bowl of dried fruits and nuts that he’d been holding, but she passed it to her mum. She was too tense to eat anything. Baralinel raised an eyebrow at her, poured a handful of dried plums in Tauriel’s lap anyway, took some herself and then walked around the fire to hand the bowl to Aelon.

Tauriel set her jaw. Imagine growing so used to explicit, feet-long dwarven contracts that woodland negotiations start flying over her head.

Aelon balanced the bowl on his knee as he stared into the fire. Slowly, his face relaxed in a grin.

“Alright. I will drink with the dwarf king, and I will fight with him, a friendly spar,” he said. “And then we will see.”

Denwech chuckled. He looked at Tauriel.

“What say you? Would Fili agree?”

Tauriel opened her mouth and then shut it again. She had no idea. A bloody battlefield flashed before her eyes, a stumble and a lost crown, a slowness to find his sword when Hithanar had burst into their room. As far as she knew, Fili had never sparred with Dwalin or anyone else since the Battle.

“He’s not one of those dwarves that knows only to count his gold while others do his fighting for him?” There was an unpleasant glint in Aelon’s eyes as he peered into hers. “He’s not a coward, is he?”

“Of course not!” Tauriel frowned. “I just don’t know what weapon he’d prefer.”

Aelon shrugged, and then bent over, storing the fruit bowl under his chair. “I don’t need that answer right now. Lighten up, my friends! It’s Nost-na-Lothion!”

*

"What you said to Aelon back there…” Baralinel shook her head as they walked briskly across Enelgalad. “And here your father keeps complaining that you never listen."

Now that Tauriel had her mother's undivided attention, she actually sighed with relief at Baralinel's apparent decision to avoid complicated topics. Those often just led to arguments. Besides, her previous upset seemed trivial against the fact that Aelon was being his usual slightly volatile self, and she was still reeling from her argument with him—and the fact it hadn't exploded back in her face—and maybe part of that reeling was because she really needed to eat something.

“Dad is right, I didn’t listen," she admitted as a gesture of good faith. "One of the dwarves gave me a short lecture on their history with elves, when King Thranduil started causing problems for Fili.”

Baralinel smiled to herself. “You may yet make a brilliant leader, my daughter. Your argumentation skills have certainly improved.”

“I’ve never wanted to be a clan leader,” Tauriel muttered. “You know that. A Captain of the Guard, or of Scouts is the most I can handle.”

“I didn’t say ‘clan’... Your father mentioned you sit on the king’s council?”

“It’s different. I advise on the old trading routes and grain costs. Report on my scouts. They don’t need me to navigate centuries-old house rivalries or foolish pride, or other nonsense, and I don’t have to take life-or-death decisions for hundreds or thousands of people. I don't think I could ever do that. Being a Captain suits me just fine, so why are you even mentioning this again?”

“Hm. You may yet learn, Gond.”

“_Don’t_ call me that, I’ve asked you a thousand times! And how does one decide to let someone die? How… How is it even supposed to work?”

“Sometimes the death of one may mean survival of a hundred others.”

“And then, what if it doesn’t work? Greater good, lesser evil… It’s not cold numbers, mother, it's _lives_, and lesser evil is still evil!”

Baralinel pursed her lips, probably only now realizing that Tauriel's short patience was hanging by a thread. She followed her mum up the stairs to their old home, inquiring about safer, more practical things, like how they were doing and whether they had managed to bring all that they needed from the Halls. Baralinel confirmed her guess that they had cleared the path between Enelgalad and the Halls, so it was reasonably safe to travel between the two. Scouts were posted all around the settlement to make sure nothing could attack them while people worked and children played on the ground.

"Heldirion is still carving the weights and shuffles that need to be replaced on your father's big loom," she recounted, pushing open a creaky door and continuing to the kitchen. "The majority of the doors need to be adjusted after these seventy years of absence. Your friend Tatharwen promised to come by with the right tools next week..."

"Sit," she pointed Tauriel to an old chair with little birds intricately carved on the back. "Eat." She placed in front of Tauriel a full plate and poured her some birch sap from a heavy clay jug, before sighing and stalking out of the kitchen to prepare her old room.

So close to the dark canopy, the air of her childhood home was permeated with the light honeyed fragrance of _galaspenna_ bloom. That, and the familiar smell of woodland roots with smoked black partridge made Tauriel light-headed. It felt like decades had passed since she'd last eaten her mother's cooking, though objectively it couldn't be more than eight months at most.

Tauriel sighed, resting her head in her palm as she ate. Why had her mother decided to pester her about leadership again? She’d told her parents long ago that she had no intention to follow in her father’s footsteps, let the Danarim elect someone else, when time comes. And why did Aelon want to fight Fili? Was it really just for fun? And Fili, he didn't have much of a choice, did he? Tauriel forcefully speared a vegetable on her fork. She didn't like to see him cornered. Didn't like him presented with something that was not a choice at all, like Thranduil had done, like Aelon was doing now. But she knew Fili wouldn't openly argue against it, because he knew his duty to his people, and somehow he always saw a bigger picture. _He_ was a brilliant leader. Somehow, he always found the strength to do what was right for everyone. But... Tauriel's cup stilled in the air as she wondered.

When had he last done something for _himself_?

*

Fili had tried to look for Tauriel, or for Denwech or Baralinel, but hadn't got very far, and that was assuming he, Gloin and Nori hadn't actually stepped on any toes by wandering about during the final preparations of a festival that was definitely not the best place for a dwarf. But he needed answers, or at least an opportunity of a discussion, as soon as possible. Fili brushed a hand over his forehead. It had been a long day, and the merriment was getting too loud again, too busy.

That's when a short elf in a blue dress and an apron, with a long, brown braid over her shoulder stopped in their path, hands on her hips. Fili couldn't be certain about her age, but she seemed a young one. She measured them with an abrupt gaze.

"Which one of you is the dwarf king?" she demanded.

Fili cleared his throat, relieved that somebody was actually speaking to them. "I am." He mentally kicked Balin's political warnings back into the foggy corners of his mind. "Fili, son of Dis. At your service."

The girl smirked. "Oh, are you?"

And that's how Fili, Gloin and Nori found themselves helping this Tatharwen remove a massive wild boar from above a firepit and section it in pieces on a few wooden planks they spread on the ground between the deserted chairs that surrounded the fire.

"You sure you don't need a bandage, uh... Gloin? I saw you just reach into the fire to get that thing off."

"It's nothing," Gloin grumbled.

"Are you dwarves really resistant to fire, like they say? How resistant?" she persisted, sleeves rolled up as she cut the chunks of meat into more sizeable portions.

"Watch." Nori winked at her and stuck his hand in the fire for five seconds. The elf narrowed her eyes and grabbed at his hand to inspect it for burns. Of course, there were none. 

Fili rolled his eyes. "So, did you really need a 'dwarf king' specifically, for this task, or...?"

"Oh, no, I _was_ asked to find you. Just that somebody else was supposed to be here to help with the boar..." The elf shook her head.

"You could've just shouted, _gwathel_, I was three fires over," came a drawling voice, and Fili scrambled to his feet, cursing his dirty hands and casually rolled up sleeves. The much taller elf with peculiar, heavily braided hair the colour of a deer's coat, stared down at him with a frown.

"So you're Fili, King Under the Mountain." He gave a short laugh. "I'm Aelon."

Fili squared his shoulders. "Well met, Master Aelon. I had been looking for you."

"And I you."

The elf helped Tatharwen move her impromptu wooden planks table to the side, where she continued the chopping, then relaxed into one of the chairs and gestured for the dwarves to take seats around the fire too. Now that Fili had the opportunity to look closer, he realized the elf lord was wearing what Fili assumed was a rather typical wood-elf hunter garb. The cream shirt and the sleeveless green robe, tied with a wide brown leather belt, reminded him of Tauriel's wardrobe back when she still used to dress in her elven fashions. On the one hand, it seemed typical. On the other hand, it probably said something about a person, when during a festival they continue wearing their fighting attire, only weapons and actual armour missing. And in case of Aelon Fili wasn't sure about either.

Again, Tauriel and her constant knives and scalemail came to mind.

Fili cleared his throat. "If you were looking for me, perhaps now would be a good time to discuss what seven dwarves and a banished elf are doing in Mirkwood."

"I know what you're doing here." Aelon shook his head. "I may not like it, but... I know."

"Hm. Word travels fast in Enelgalad."

"Word does."

Fili felt his hands draw into fists as he tensed. Was that last phrase supposed to mean something more? And could he actually trust that the word that had reached Aelon was a correct one, coming straight from Tauriel, and not through two or three interim messengers?

"And have you had the opportunity," Fili tried, feeling like he was walking on glass, "to, uh..."

"Word travels fast," Aelon cut in with an impatient gesture. "Decisions do not."

"Not on a festival where we celebrate life. Not when the decision could mean death," he explained. Then he asked something to Tatharwen in elvish, but she wasn't even looking at him. She was looking somewhere over the firepit, and when Fili turned... His mind went blank.

Tatharwen meanwhile launched herself at Tauriel with a loud squeal, chattering at her in Sindarin, touching her face, laughing, while Tauriel just hugged her closer, nose buried in the other elf's hair. Baralinel, with a large basket of other foodstuffs in hand, neatly stepped around the two friends, nodded at Fili, shot a suspicious glance at Aelon and then started to unpack her basket. 

"I see you two have met," Denwech smiled at Fili, put down a cask of wine and then took the chair besides Aelon. "It seems everything is ready. Shall we begin, my friend?"

The two conversed in elvish for a moment, and still Fili couldn't tear his eyes off Tauriel. She was in a _dress_. Green, long _dress_ with a simple brown sash and wide sleeves gathered above her elbows, and a generous cut showing off her pale shoulders. And _barefoot_ unless his eyes or this firelit gloomy darkness were deceiving him.

He realized he'd been staring only when Nori clapped him on the shoulder, and complained that there were not enough chairs for everyone. Denwech and Tatharwen rushed off to find some more, Aelon had disappeared somewhere, and Baralinel meanwhile stripped the furs from the chairs. Nori and Gloin came up with a handful of nails—and Tauriel's mother had looked quite disturbed by the fact they had just pulled them from their pockets—and they quickly shaped the wooden planks into some simple benches that, once covered with furs, were just perfect sitting material, according to the dwarves.

Fili was achingly, sharply aware of Tauriel's nearness as she had sat down on the fur-covered ground by his low chair, watching the activity with a small smile on her lips.

He swallowed thickly, wanting to ask her something. Anything, to break the weirdness of the moment.

Denwech pressed a cup of wine in his hand and passed one to Tauriel too. Tatharwen had returned without an apron and plopped down on Tauriel's right, curling into her side like a cat.

TUU-UUUUU-UUN! sounded from somewhere to his near left, an unexpected reverberation that shocked Fili to the bones.

"_Nost-na-Lothion!_" Aelon cried in a resounding voice, standing tall and holding a large horn he had dug out of somewhere at the last moment. Other horns and drums and gleeful exclamations answered him from other fires. "_Nost na gwaloth, na imloth, na cuil cîr!_" 

A victorious clamour rose up in the air, repeating Aelon's words in several hundred voices, but all Fili could hear was "_Baruk Khazâd!_"-

"He's hailing the birth of flowers," Tauriel murmured, leaning in.

-and the ringing of swords-

"Of blossoms and of valleys full of bloom, and a life renewed..."

-and the wet noise of a war-axe falling against a skull-

"Are you alright?"

Fili blinked, finding himself gazing into warm hazel eyes. Her hand was on his knee, his own clammy over hers, and Tatharwen was glancing at them curiously over Tauriel's shoulder.

"What _is_ Nost-na-Lothion?" he breathed.

"Oh, it's something like-" Denwech chimed in enthusiastically. He leaned forward, passing to Fili a wooden bowl of roast boar and some vegetables. How had he even heard Fili's question?

"Nost-na-Lothion is the celebration of new life, new freedom,” he said, eyes crinkling in the smile of a loremaster pleased to explain. “Particularly that which our ancestors gained when turning aside from the Great Journey and finding themselves in these green vales and forests, with clear, singing streams and secret little lakes. It was a joyous place for wood-elves. Even Aelon here remembers what Greenwood was like, and he's just what, two thousand years old?"

"Two thousand one hundred," Aelon drawled, dropping back in his chair and reaching for his cup of wine.

"And Nost-na-Lothion is when we found ourselves free to enjoy it," Tatharwen added with a mischievous grin.

"The die was cast." Denwech leaned back in his chair and put an arm around his wife's shoulders when she took the free chair between him and Fili. "The decision was made, not to cross over the dangerous Misty Mountains, not to try and reach this fabled Valinor anymore but to enjoy the here and now. The other Eldar had left with the Rider, the Vala Oromë, and..." he glanced down at his wife, a teasing smile on his lips. "What was that expression your grandmother used? Cat out of a bag?"

"Cat out of the _house_, the mice dance on the table," Baralinel corrected him wryly.

"So, Nost-na-Lothion is that dance of the mice." Denwech chuckled. "Joyful, carefree... Not too concerned with what lurks in the shadows."

Fili took a deep breath and shoved away the memories he had been sure he'd left in the past. He gulped down his wine, still feeling Tauriel’s gaze on him. Fuck, that was some strong stuff. Probably had to be, to get _elves_ drunk. But Denwech was right. This was not the night to be concerned with the shadows, especially when that was all they were, immaterial ghosts of the past and tricks of a weak mind.

No, tonight it was Nost-na-Lothion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tauriel's [dress](https://i.etsystatic.com/5301356/r/il/426717/838874041/il_1588xN.838874041_m0vk.jpg). Inspo for [Aelon](https://i.pinimg.com/564x/3b/e7/b1/3be7b1e64e45b6614423fdfc31696cf6.jpg) and his [outfit](https://pmcfootwearnews.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/silence-movie-costume-5.jpg?w=683).
> 
> _Gwathel_ [Sind.] - sister, associate.. Basically: mate, buddy, friend.
> 
> Additionally, here's a disclaimer: yeah, Fili has some form of PTSD from the Battle, it didn't totally go away after "Roots in Stone". It did (magically) get better through time, more stress-free environment and the presence of an ancient spirit on his mental landscape. The disclaimer being, I know I'm probably not writing it very realistically, so let's call it magical/fantasy PTSD.


	11. It's Nost-na-Lothion II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yooo, guess who's done with the university for the summer!  
This one had been lying in the drafts just waiting for revisions, but in general, yeah, I'm back to writing :)

The other dwarves had joined them as soon as Nori told them there was good food to be had and Dali reminded them the elves needed to be watched. Soon though their makeshift benches by the fire moved aside, full bellies and full mugs of strong wine ensuring the dwarves could have their own merry gathering with crude jokes and tall tales, while also keeping an eye on Fili and the clan leaders as they lounged around the fire, the air permeated with loud voices and distant drumbeat that Fili tried his best to ignore.

Same as he tried to ignore the hard glances Aelon kept boring him with from across the fire. Same as he tried to ignore Tauriel's bare toes pressing against his boot as she'd turned to talk with her friend in hushed tones, their suppressed chuckles making the ruby red wine slosh in their cups as they were catching up.

Sitting in the low chair between Baralinel and Tauriel, he watched a procession of children weaving through the fires, waving sticks adorned with colourful ribbons and singing something in elvish. The adults answered something in verse and, as far as Fili understood, tried to bribe at least some of them to stay by their fire. Sometimes a few children left the file, laughing, sometimes none stayed, and the procession moved on, followed by adult laughter and applause.

"The game is called the Great Journey," Baralinel said, leaning closer, when the procession neared their own fire. "The first one plays the Vala Oromë and their task is to make sure all their followers reach 'Valinor', the last fire on their journey. And everyone else plays forest spirits, trying to convince them to stay."

"Tough task, for one child to hold the attention of thirty or so others throughout the game," Fili murmured, watching as Denwech sprang up from his seat, hurriedly patted down his robes and then reached out to a smallish boy, imploring him empty-handed. Aelon cuffed him on the head and sang something to the same boy, gesturing wildly.

Tauriel snorted at Fili's side. "The game is not won by reaching Valinor," she said. "It's won by whoever gains the most by staying: they later tally their prizes and any outrageous promises they've garnered. The rules allow even Oromë to stay where he wants. Right now, Aelon's enticing that boy with eternal glory and a valiant death on a battlefield." 

Baralinel raised her eyebrows. "Did you expect anything else from Aelon?"

The boy laughed at the antics of both leaders and then pointed at Fili. Next he knew, four elven children stood gathered around him, giggling, and Tauriel leaned back against Tatharwen's chest, both well in their cups and sniggering loudly.

"You are dwarf?" the eldest girl asked him in simple Westron. "What is that on your face?"

Fili chuckled. "My beard?"

"Beard," she tested the word on her tongue. "You are small. Where are parents?"

"My parents? No, I am an adult."

The smaller boy spoke up. "But you short, like child."

Fili grinned. He could see their point, even the smallest girl of the four would reach his shoulder if he stood up.

"No, I'm afraid I'm of quite an average height—for a dwarf."

Grinning, Tatharwen suggested them something in elvish. The children turned appraising looks at Fili. 

"She asked if they'd stay if you give them dwarven gold," Tauriel chuckled. "Because-"

"Everyone knows dwarves bring luck," Tatharwen said, grinning widely, but she was looking over the fire at Aelon. 

"Dwarves bring trouble," he slurred and lobbed a dried plum at her.

"Luck!" She stuck out her tongue at him, and Fili couldn't believe these people shared any remote ancestry at all with the ones who lived in Rivendell.

"That's what the Lakemen believe, where have you been wandering about, _gwathel?_"

They switched to elven, and judging by Tauriel's groan, the nonsense continued. Baralinel called out to someone nearby and then left. The children ran off to pester the other dwarves, and it looked like they had struck gold with Nori and Bofur, because soon enough all four were sitting with them, chatting in Westron, shyly pawing at their beards and admiring all the random mess one could usually find in dwarven pockets, from nails to coins, to spare bootstraps, pipes, hair beads and playing cards. Even Dali and Borg had small smiles on their faces as they watched, because whatever dwarves felt about elves, they were always kind with children. No, Fili was not worried.

What did worry him was the slowly rising drum beat from two fires over. But then Baralinel came back and dropped some string instrument in Denwech's lap. The loremaster laughed, and when his slender fingers ran over the strings, the drums receded and a whimsical song rose up instead. Baralinel joined him, her velvety, low voice a beautiful backdrop to Denwech's clear baritone, and soon enough some other elves had wandered over to their fire, some listening and some joining in, singing and clapping a twelve-beat rhythm.

Tatharwen ordered Tauriel to finish her cup, dragged her, complaining, to her feet, and then they danced.

Fili watched, gobsmacked, as his Captain of the Scouts gradually forgot her grumbling and transformed into a _swan_, graceful and strong, sleeves riding up as her arms rose in a wide circle above her head, shoulders pulled back and chin raised proudly. The steps seemed simple enough at first, but as the two kicked up the hems of their dresses and changed places, the combinations became more and more complicated, a step to the side, and another, hems flying again, laughter, a clap of hands and turning to change places again, right hands gripping each other's waists, and the left ones keeping the dresses from catching fire as they turned. Mahal, how her streaming hair shone in the firelight, how her bare feet kicked up soot and moss, how her back arched, how her pale shins and shoulders gleamed against the dark backdrop of the forest.

Baralinel was clapping the rhythm by his side, and Fili almost jumped when she leaned in and said something to him, the cheerful singing carried on by Denwech and the newcomers. 

"Ask her to sing," Baralinel repeated.

Fili shook his head, still finding it impossible to tear his gaze from the two dancers. "She doesn't. Not since her exile."

"She is back now."

He gave her a crooked half-smile and shook his head again. "She's here because I forced her. I'm done asking things of her, at least for a while."

Baralinel gave him a strange look, but then Tauriel dropped down by his other side, chest heaving and beads of sweat running down her neck as she grinned and grabbed his cup of wine. She drank it in one go, eyes sparkling with secret mischief as she wiped her mouth against her forearm.

"Why don't you sing for us, Denwechiel?" Aelon seemed to have no such misgivings against asking. "Or are you out of breath already?"

An irrational anger spiked up in Fili, even as Tauriel shook her head, refusing. What right did the elf have to ask? And what right did Fili have to get jealous about it? He leaned forward, holding out their empty cups for Denwech to fill, and then handed to Tauriel hers. Somehow, she had managed to use the short moment to start arguing with her mother in tense, hushed tones. He needed to ask her something important though, so Fili ran his free hand lightly down her back, intending to distract her, and judging from the hitch in her breath, he'd succeeded, except when her warm eyes turned to him, he suddenly had no idea what he'd wanted to say.

"I, er, I've been meaning to ask," he stammered, leaning in closer. Dammit, gooseflesh was rising on the side of her neck where his breath brushed against her skin. Fili momentarily clenched his jaw before continuing. "Aelon—did you speak with him before? Will he help?"

Why did that question feel like it was from some entirely different life? Tauriel blinked owlishly, but again the elven leader interrupted unwanted, a wide grin on his face as he waved at him from across the fire.

"Fili, son of Dis! If she doesn't sing then come sit with me, and let's drink!"

Fili gritted his teeth and started to get up, when Tauriel grabbed his wrist and either he was drunker than he thought, or Tauriel had finally learned how to disbalance a dwarf, but he almost fell on her, wine spilling, hands finding purchase on the furs and her waist as she sat leaning on her arm. 

"The Danarim have agreed to help," she murmured in his ear, sending a jolt of fire down his spine. "Aelon will help, if he likes you." She raised her hand and tugged lightly on his braids. "Let down your hair. Forget tomorrow, forget yesterday. Drink."

She held out her cup for him, a strange gleam in her eyes, and perhaps tomorrow Fili would stop and think what it was, but tonight he just sat back on his heels and drank it up, the strong alcohol hitting his head like a hammer and thankfully taking care of the growing discomfort in his pants. He blamed the wine and his Captain's green dress for that one.

"Gond, I _told_ you not to-" Baralinel sounded angry somewhere over his shoulder.

"And _I_ told you not to call me that!" Tauriel snarled at her and then they continued snapping at each other in elvish.

He'd have to ask her what _gond_ meant. Fili's head was spinning. Later. He'd ask her later.

*

Tauriel watched Fili stumble lightly as he grabbed his chair and moved over to Aelon's side, pretending that it was just worry for her friend that twisted her gut and not the dizzying loss of his closeness. Either way, she blamed the wine.

"_Tauriel_." Her mother crouched down by her side, her hushed voice still wrought with fury. "One thing I told you not to do tonight, one thing!"

"And I haven't!"

"I saw you-"

"Tell Fili to get drunk? Tell _my king_ to lose control, because apparently that's the only way to gain Aelon's trust?"

"You didn't have to-"

"Leave it, mother." Tauriel shot up to her feet, bile rising in her throat. "It's not what you think, and I don't need your meddling."

Baralinel stood up too, her furious whisper barely audible over the laughter, singing and dancing that continued around the fire. "It's not meddling when it's for your own good! You're not ready. Not for him. And neither is he for you. Give anyone else your drinks tonight, but leave the dwarf alone."

"He's my _friend,_ mother!"

"The whole night, he's only had eyes for you."

"Are you mocking me? The whole night, I was next to _you!_ "

"If you don't believe me, that just proves my point."

"It proves nothing!"

With a huff, Tauriel stormed off, before the argument could turn even uglier. It wouldn't have been the first time, her tearing into her mother for meddling, and Baralinel accusing her of being blind to her own reflection, her talents, her strengths. What beauty was she talking of?! Tauriel was a washed-out dishrag next to her mother, a fumbling fool compared to her uncanny intuition, a reckless failure filled to the brim with self-righteous stupidity and dreams of kinslaying. Fili, taken with _her_? No. No, the very idea was preposterous, and she would have no clue what to do with it even if it were somehow true.

Even if she couldn't stop thinking about his fingers trailing down her spine. Even if she couldn't quite get the scent of his hair from her mind. 

Knowledge of what hid beneath his clothes, of that damned drawing on his skin in weak amber lamplight.

She wound her way among the fires, restless and angry, but again and again her feet carried her back towards their fire, like a moth drawn in by the flame. She was worried, that was all. She was torn between wanting to make sure Fili was alright and wanting to enjoy the festival and catch up with her people, and at the same time feeling strangely out of place, like she didn't quite belong in this celebration of life. They sang of bravely challenging the darkness, but she'd learned to befriend it. They sang of the stars, and she found herself wondering if up close they'd look like that dwarven-made necklace of white gems and mithril. She had to wonder if they'd lost someone they loved in the Battle, if their cheerfulness was not forced, if their laughter was not tinged with sorrow. And perhaps she was a bit drunker than she should be, and the last time that had happened, her prisoners had escaped, Kili had been shot, Smaug had woken from his decades-long slumber and burned down Laketown, and... Tauriel took a deep breath and decided she was done drinking for tonight. She snagged a jug of birch sap from a neighbouring fire as she passed.

Perhaps, she _had_ been playing with a thought, when she'd handed that drink to Fili. An idle game, gently mocking a tradition; a harmless what-if, even as she'd known she didn't really mean it. 

She leaned against a tree on the other side of the fire, watching Fili talk with Aelon. She didn't know how long she'd been gone, but he looked surprisingly relaxed, while the Alma seemed to be paying more attention to his wine and the dancers, particularly... Tatharwen? That could not be good news. 

Frowning, Tauriel stepped forward, lowering herself quietly on the furs at Fili's side again. She poured some birch sap in Fili's cup and something unclenched in her chest when their fingers brushed as he took the drink, as he smiled with secret relief when he tasted it.

"Yes, the clans lived throughout the forest, Greenwood the Great it was called. Was bigger too," Aelon continued the conversation from before Tauriel had joined them, slurring the words slightly. He grinned when he noticed her and passed her a platter of cheese. "A capital, of sorts, and later Oropher's seat, was in Amon Lanc, now called Dol Guldur."

"Did you live there?" Fili asked. It sounded to Tauriel like he had to make some effort to enunciate clearly.

"No, but my parents did. I was born later, after the War of the Last Alliance. The clans had scattered. Amon Lanc was no more, Enelgalad stood half-empty. So we decided to throw in our lot with the Danarim."

Tauriel winced at the mention of Amon Lanc. How had she managed to amass so many things she needed to tell Fili, and in such short time? Considering their current state and how much more drunker they would undoubtedly get as the night wore on, it probably wasn't the best time or place to have this conversation, but Tauriel couldn't hold it in any longer. She needed to know what Fili thought.

"My father says Dol Guldur is free of the shadow now," she spoke up.

Aelon scowled as he shook his head. "It can never return to what it used to be. I'd rather burn that place to the ground, leave no stone unturned on that cursed hill."

"Have you been there... since?" Tauriel asked, and Aelon looked at her as if she was the crazy one.

"That place was crawling with demons and fell spirits even without the Enemy returned to it, I bet it's no different now. I remember that so-called Watchful Peace of that piece-of-shit council. Not so watchful, were they?"

Fili frowned. "Wait, what enemy? What council?"

Aelon shot him a long, measuring look, and Tauriel swallowed a groan. No, this hadn't been the best time or place to start this discussion.

"Sauron," Aelon said simply, as if it should have been obvious. "And the White Council, probably named so for their pristine white asses they couldn't bother to rise from their seats any sooner."

"It's Gandalf, Lord Elrond, Lady Galadriel..." Tauriel murmured. "Thranduil is apparently furious they didn't tell him who exactly had been living in his father's ancient stronghold, nor that they'd banished him. My dad thinks that's how he found out about your mother's whereabouts: having busy correspondence with Rivendell."

Fili swallowed thickly and then simply nodded. Aelon raised an eyebrow.

"I've been wondering," he drawled, changing the subject completely. "You, son of Dis. Wasn't Dis the little _princess_ that escaped the dragon all those years ago? It's a female name, right?"

Fili nodded. "It is. Though there is not a lot of difference with dwarf names."

"I thought dwarves followed the father's line in naming?"

"We do." Fili tilted his head, thinking. It looked to Tauriel like he was steeling himself, forcing himself to take her advice and open up to the elf. Aelon had told about himself freely, after all. Aelon usually did.

"My father's family was from Moria though," he continued, and she saw Aelon nod in appreciation. "By the time my mother married, Moria had been lost many years ago, and my father's family had lost much of their influence. He died, and by the time I was named Thorin's heir, they'd started calling me and my brother sons of Dis instead."

Aelon hummed. "A reminder of a claim took priority over tradition. Do you like it, son of Dis, that they went out of their way like that? Are you ashamed of your father?"

Fili shook his head. "He was a good man. It's not his fault they lost Moria. If we had abandoned or failed our quest for Erebor, a few generations down the line my family would have been in the same position, lords in nothing but name only."

"What was his name?"

"Favri, son of Gwarin."

Aelon then called out to someone, demanding the return of his wine pitcher, and for a moment Tauriel just revelled in the atmosphere, Fili's calm covering her worries and frustration with her mother like a blanket. She thought back to the Mountain, and for the first time in her life she realized she was missing someone during Nost-na-Lothion. For the first time, the festival felt so much _smaller_ than her life, because it didn't include Dwalin's caustic commentary, Algunna's quiet questions, Tilda's chatter and Sigrid's clear laughter. And Fili... years upon years of his life lay leagues from this forest, Aelon's questions having uncovered only a small part of it.

Meanwhile Fili pulled out his pipe and unhurriedly packed it, then leaned forward and pulled a burning twig from the fire to light it. That's when Tauriel noticed his hands were shaking lightly. Remembering earlier, she glanced over her shoulder at a nearby fire where three drum players had been just joined by a fourth one, met with cheering and loud demands to find somebody else with a flute. Fili seemed to be holding up alright for now, but it had been a long day and the drinking probably hadn't helped either.

Aelon returned, grinning triumphantly, a jug of wine and another wheel of cheese in his hands. He plopped down in his chair, crossed his ankle over his knee, and for a moment just watched with curiosity as Fili smoked, before turning his attention to cutting the cheese.

"So," he drawled, throwing a sideways look at Fili. "Would you prefer to be called son of Favri?"

Tauriel glanced up in surprise. Fili was staring at the fire, legs outstretched and crossed at the ankles belying his tension, blue smoke rising from his pipe as he considered.

"I would," he finally said, sounding surprised himself. "Not meaning any disrespect to my mother, but... It's like you said. They went out of their way to change the convention, and I understand why they did, but... Yeah, I'd like it."

Aelon chuckled and clapped Fili on the shoulder, and Tauriel felt herself breathe again, until Aelon opened his mouth again. 

"Then there's just that matter of fighting you!" 

Fili shot a startled look at Tauriel, and Aelon laughed. 

"Spar!" Tauriel snapped. "What Aelon meant to say is spar!"

"What exactly are the conditions of your clan's help?" Fili asked the Alma, his eyes narrowed in annoyance.

Aelon let his gaze roam over the boisterous, singing and laughing groups of people milling in the firelit clearing.

"When I see a dwarf and an elf dancing, then I will help you," he drawled.

Fili clenched his jaw.

_"Is he mocking us?"_ he unexpectedly asked Tauriel in Khuzdul.

She gulped. She'd been repeatedly told the language was sacred and very much secret—besides being a language she was far from fluent in yet. Aelon watched them, curiosity and something else, something unreadable shining in his eyes.

_"He's not,_" she muttered. _"I think he's not. It's how his clan builds, um, agreeing. Dancing together is... one way he'll see if his people are wanting to get along with the dwarves."_

She thought she saw Fili swallow thickly, but his voice was smooth as he turned back to the clan leader and nodded.

"What weapon, Master Aelon?"

The Alma waved his hand magnanimously and possibly not a little bit drunkenly. "You're my guest, Fili Favrion."


	12. Flowers of Enelgalad

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter brought to you by quite a number of HEMA tournament videos and a bottle of rosé. Enjoy! ♡  
And I know there's a lot going on here, but damn do I want to see your comments on this :D

A clamour rose when Aelon stood and announced his intention to spar with Fili, demanding someone fetch his sword. Baralinel jumped up in front of him, arguing with him in Sindarin and gesturing angrily, while Denwech put his hand on Aelon's shoulder, trying to talk his friend down in calmer and more collected tones. Tatharwen was trying very hard not to laugh. Fili had already sent Gloin to get his double blades, and Tauriel felt her unease growing as sweat beaded on Fili's brow and Aelon gently swayed on his feet.

"Fine!" He threw up his hands when two other clan elders joined Baralinel in berating him. "But just because.. Because I can be sensible. I'll prove it, just watch me! You watch me, oh you wise elders of the Almarim!"

Baralinel scowled, hands on her hips. Tatharwen was still attempting to keep a straight face and failing miserably, and Tauriel _definitely_ needed to find out what was going on with her friend and Aelon. Denwech clapped his shoulder in approval, then turned to intercept the young elf who was rushing back through the gathering crowd with Aelon's sword in its sheath.

Aelon grinned unnervingly.

"Right, listen!" he called out, tall and proud. Tauriel didn't pay further attention to him as she leaned down to Fili instead.

"Tell me," she urged him softly. "I need to know. If something is wrong, we can think how to work around it, to reason with Aelon before he comes up with something worse. But I need to know what's going on in your head, Fili. Please."

The young dwarf set his jaw and planted his feet, glancing up at her with stubborn determination.

And just like that, in the middle of dancing fires and half a thousand arguing loud elves, he was _more_ once again—a creature carved from the roots of the mountains, from rocks and stone; a king of golden birch leaves and white jewels like the stars. He was... Mortal as he was, there was something _timeless_ in him. Tauriel broke her gaze, straightening up and yet hesitant to remove her hand from his shoulder. For a moment, she felt as if through him, she too could gain the sheer audacity of the dwarves to bend the world to her will.

"Denwechiel!" She whipped her head around as Aelon waved his hand, presenting her to a cheering crowd. At her alarmed confusion, he grinned lazily and repeated, still in Sindarin: "Denwechiel shall fight the dwarf king instead of me. That's an even enough, a fair enough solution, don't you agree?"

"What is he saying?" 

Tauriel glanced down at Fili again. "He wants _me_ to spar with you."

"And?" he challenged her quietly. "Is that a problem?"

Tauriel held his gaze this time. "Is it?"

"Never."

Tauriel could only accept that answer. Fili brushed his hand over hers, his rough fingers so familiar against hers, and then Baralinel handed her Aelon's sword and they found themselves in a quickly formed circle of her excited clan mates, fires burning to her right and back. The Ereboreans were laughing and starting to place bets. The elders were talking with Aelon again, while Denwech cleared his throat and quickly went over the rules, probably less for the benefit of the fighters and more to calm down Borg and Dali, who were wearing heavy scowls and muttering between themselves.

"Hey, missy!" Nori pushed through the front line and tossed her the dwarven longsword she'd been training with.

"No fair!" came some cries from the crowd. "Is she fighting for the clans or for the dwarves?"

"Tauriel, take Aelon's sword!"

"Or take my daggers instead!"

"Is that even a sword, or a blunt mace do you think?" A peal of laughter erupted to her left.

"I'll take my own weapon," she announced over the din of the voices. The weight of the dwarven steel grounded Tauriel. "It's not a competition, Master Aelon, is it?"

"Why, on Nost-na-Lothion, everyone's a winner!" The elf threw his head back laughing. Wordlessly, Tauriel returned to him his sword and then tucked up her wide skirt.

She and Fili started, circling each other slowly. The packed ground was slightly slippery beneath her bare feet. Nobody in their audience seemed concerned about their lack of armour or use of real blades, recently sharpened and perfecly balanced. A small step back, a step forward, swords touching lightly, just measuring distance and measuring up each other. Fili seemed to be holding up alright. Perhaps she'd misjudged his state.

He thrust forward first, she parried and countered, the hefty weapon requiring a more grounded style than her elven daggers. Speed meant something else when you held a dwarven longsword. Speed could only come from control, and control was the only way she could counter Fili's much faster attacks, block his cuts and slashes coming at her from a slightly lower angle than she'd learned to expect from her older and taller teacher.

He lunged at her, fires lighting up a rare fierceness in his eyes, as they clashed and retreated, sliced, cut, thrust and parried. Someone seemed to be keeping score but she didn't care. At some point she stopped holding herself back and worrying. At some point he ducked, kicked out and tripped her, and that's how she learned how caravan guards fight dirty on crumbling, lonely roads in the West. She rolled away from his next attack, the dress bunching high up her thighs, and then kicked him in the chest, sending him sprawling on the ground and demonstrating him the benefits of regular riding on near-vertical, rocky slopes. And it _had_ taken her quite some time and dedication to learn how to knock down a dwarf, she was quite proud of that.

Their blades rang as they clashed, a controlled hit for a hit, neither gaining the upper hand. The spectators and their cries faded away, the world narrowing down to her and Fili, his sure footwork and the way he moved in his light linen tunic, muscles tensing and relaxing in a skillful display of strength, a playful control of moment and leverage, his double swords always stopping half an inch from her skin whenever he scored. Tauriel's arms shook with the raw might it took to parry his attacks and use the few openings he left her.

Why was the fight still continuing? Was Aelon making some kind of point?

They were both panting. Sweat was trickling in Fili's eyes, and centuries of practice with her daggers were starting to trickle through in her fighting, grip relaxing, expecting to spin her weapon, footwork growing less grounded and more dance-like. Mistakes. Her focus was slipping, the hour had been well past midnight already when they'd started.

She twisted away from a thrust, leaving her back open. With her lighter daggers she would have completed the turn already, when Fili struck her hard beneath the ribs with a pommel. 

"Ahh!"

Sharp pain blurred the edges of her vision as she stumbled and fell. 

A roar rose, angry voices calling foul. For a long moment it was hard to breathe.

Fili was there in seconds, digging his hand under her ribs and instantly putting a relieving pressure on her side. "Mahal, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, Tauriel, I thought you'd-" 

"Where did you hit her? Right side? The liver?" Her father's calm voice. Fili shifted, still pressing on her side but pulling her head in his lap, while slender, ringless fingers examined her ribs. Tatharwen crouched down next to Fili, urgently asking if she was going to be alright. Bofur and Nori, and even Gloin and Dali were hovering around her as well.

"Fine. I'm fine," Tauriel choked out. She closed her eyes and focused on the feel of Fili's other hand in her hair, stroking it lightly even as it was shaking. A way off, Baralinel was yelling at Aelon again, something about recklessness and extending the match needlessly.

She gently removed Fili's hand from her side and laced her fingers through his, sending him a lopsided smile as the pain gradually receded. 

He shook his head. "I should've stopped," he murmured. "Should've noticed you were in no position to block me."

"It's not your fault, Fili. And I'm a fighter. Sparring accidents are just part of life."

"An awesome fight, by the way," Tatharwen volunteered, straightening Tauriel's skirt and then standing up, dusting off her own dress. "I don't know anything about fighting, but it certainly looked impressive. Now I'll go make you a nice spot by the fire so you can lie down more comfortably. Hey, Master Bofur, would you come help?" With all three dwarves except Dali volunteering, her friend winked at her and skipped away.

"Well, the ribs seem undamaged," Denwech concluded his examination, and Fili's shoulders sagged in relief. "She'll probably have a huge bruise, but it's nothing to worry about. Nice move too, according to Aelon. Tauriel, you just need to rest now, you hear me?"

Tauriel just nodded tiredly.

***

"Really, I'm fine, you don't have to worry," the elf protested as Fili and her father helped her up. Fili was reluctant to let her go, his hand pressed lightly against her lower back, and he refused to contemplate whether it was not too forward. Minutes ago, he could've accidentally killed her. He was nowhere even close to even facing that fact either.

"Well, _you_ are going to bed. In fact, we all are," he declared instead. Denwech nodded at him in agreement. He bade them goodnight and left to rejoin the celebration, calling out to Tatharwen as he passed. Dori had meanwhile picked up their weapons. Fili slung them under his arm and then ordered the rest of the company to beds too. A new, slow drumbeat and a haunting song were emerging from some ways off, and Fili was _done__._

"I'm really ready to call it a night," he sighed, turning to the elf expectantly. "So point me to your tree and let's tuck you in, so we both get some rest before tomorrow's march."

Tauriel crossed her arms self-consiously. "You don't need to walk me all that way up, I told you I'm fine."

"Last time I sent you off on your own, you ended up in a cave-in."

He felt her shudder at the mention, but then she just shook her head. 

"You do remember I'm immortal?" she tried with a crooked grin. 

Fili shrugged. "You've almost died at least five times, and that's just in the time that I've known you. So forgive me if I'm not putting much stock in this immortality of yours. Now quit stalling and let's go. Please. Let me make sure you're alright."

Tauriel gave up. She glanced around as if committing it all to memory, then turned and wordlessly led the way through the fires, now crackling low amid overturned chairs and discarded things as the elves had scattered into the forest as part of their new game, whatever it was about. They didn't speak as she led him up the winding stair lit with small, colourful lanterns, with some steps wobbly and some missing entirely. 

"Enelgalad was abandoned for some seventy years when King Thranduil ordered all clans to move to the Halls," she quietly explained as they climbed. "Renovations are underway, but it will take some time for it to become what it used to be."

"So your people literally live in trees, like squirrels?" Fili teased, carefully climbing over two missing steps. 

The elf laughed lightly. "Same as your people make warrens under ground like badgers."

They came to the platform some dizzying thirty yards from the ground, and then there were more stairs with graceful banisters and more platforms and lightweight bridges connecting what was evidently different rooms and terraces of an entire house built in a tree.

The door was warped with age, and the hinges needed oiling. The corridor and what must have been a living room looked slightly worn around the edges, even though everything seemed in order, lovingly scrubbed clean and quite cosy, with colourful lanterns left burning here and there throughout the house.

Tauriel pushed open another door. "My old room." Fili followed after her, too tired and overwhelmed by the long day to think much about anything.

It was smaller than her room in the Halls. His steps landed on a creaky wooden floor and a moth-eaten rug. There was a wardrobe by the far wall and a washing table, and a chair next to it with some linens on it and Tauriel's scalemail shirt folded over its back. A wet towel was drying on a windowsill. There were some faded drawings on the walls, in greying frames and slightly wavy with moisture. The only new thing seemed the freshly made bed, covered with a heavy knit blanket and a handful of furs. Tucked into a corner was a spinning wheel, two large baskets with uncarded wool, and a few more chairs stacked on each other. Apparently her parents had been using her room as a bit of storage space, which Fili supposed was fair enough. Nobody had probably expected her back for a century or so until Thranduil's mood changed. 

She slumped with a sigh on her bed, pulling up her dress and examining a grazed knee in the low light from the amber lantern she'd brought in from the living room. Fili winced, remembering vividly how she'd crushed to the ground when he'd hit her.

He put down their weapons he'd been carrying, located a metal bowl and poured in some water from a bucket that stood near the washing table. Grabbing a washcloth and a fresh towel, he put it down by the bed and knelt in front of her.

"Let me take care of that."

Tauriel swallowed and then hesitantly nodded. He pressed the wet cloth against her chafed skin, gently cleaning it and trying to ignore how she twitched when he wrapped his other hand around her calf to hold it still. Her skin was pale, unmarred by any scars. Soft. Warm.

"Tell me," she asked him again, her voice soothing in the low light like the scent of summer grass. He knew what she was asking, but what could he tell her? Where did his damned weakness even begin, where would it end? He'd hurt _her _of all people today, because he'd been focussing so hard on ignoring the clamouring crowd and the clash of weapons that he'd failed to notice her misstep in time.

Fili sagged, bowing his head in shame, touching his forehead to her other knee. And since when had he grown so familiar with her? He'd need to do something about it later, but right now it felt like the night air itself, coming through the paneless windows and fragrant with something blooming up there in the dark canopy, was a living, breathing thing, beating a quiet, honeyed pulse between them, and he was in no state to remain unaffected.

"I thought I'd put it behind me," he tried as he gave in to the moment. "The memories of the Battle. I had no idea that... I apparently can't deal with... I had no idea, when we ventured out of the mountain, Tauriel. I'd thought, drums—maybe I should be avoiding drums, because that's what tripped me up during that first coronation attempt, and they almost did so again tonight, but then earlier it was Aelon's _horn_. What if it doesn't stop with drums _and_ horns; what if I just...

"When that hit landed and you collapsed, I... I don't know what I'd been thinking. Thank Mahal it was with the pommel and not the blade. I wasn't... I wasn't really _there_, Tauriel. My memories get scrambled sometimes, times and places melting together, and it's... It chills me to the bone, this losing of myself, and I hate it so much you can't imagine."

He forced himself to stop rambling, could well imagine the pity in her eyes. Maybe he even deserved it, the broken, piece of shit dwarf that he was. He straightened up slightly, gently picking up her left foot and starting to wash away the dirt and the ash. His thumb brushed over two thin braided anklets she'd apparently been wearing inside her boots.

"I used to lose sense of time entirely," he continued. "Hasn't happened since... since we went down to the Galleries of the Dead. But how can I ever be sure..? What if..."

What if that too comes back, minutes or hours where he loses himself and comes to in a room, in a situation he has no memory of entering? 

What if he crumbles the farther he goes from the Mountain's calming presence?

"I can't heal anymore," she said after a while, clasping her hands tightly in her lap. "After the Battle, after witnessing all that death... I lost that power."

Fili frowned, glancing up at her.

"But you patched me up well enough that night. You saved my life."

Tauriel looked away. "Patched up, yes. Stitching a wound or sticking some _athelas_ in it is easy. But what I did for Kili... That I cannot do anymore."

Fili remembered the look of gobsmacked awe on his brother's face. He wondered what he'd seen when Tauriel had healed him, had it been some otherworldly, blessed light, or had it been just her kindness he'd fallen in love with? Either way, knowing she'd lost such a brilliant part of herself in that damn battle left a sharp ache in Fili's heart.

"Do you think it is gone forever?"

"I don't know. I haven't had the chance to talk to my father about it yet. My mum lost the power too, a long time ago, but... she doesn't even want it back. So... I don't know."

Fili nodded, hands itching to hug the elf. Instead, he towelled her foot dry and picked up the other, quietly marvelling how such a thin ankle and high instep could support such heavy fighting to rival his.

"I used to be a terrible fighter," he said, surprising himself and blaming it on all the confessions happening anyway. Tauriel shifted and glanced down at him, brow raised in disbelief.

"I used to... live a lot in my own head. Still do," he continued quietly. "Abstract ideas, concepts, theories, all those intuitive hunches... I loved working in a smithy, making all sorts of blades, even when I couldn't use them all that well, but those were some damn good blades. But I could never quite explain the process to the others. I just _knew_ how hot it needs to be in the forge, and how cold the water needs to be for tempering, and how many times it should be repeated and in what order...

"And then, when my father had been dead for a good twelve years or so, Thorin decided I was to be his heir, and I _needed_ to train, so I took my blades and all my dogged determination and tried to trick myself into wanting to enhance _that_."

Tauriel frowned. "Trick yourself into wanting to fight?"

"Into _understanding_ it the way I understood steel. Into wanting to fight _well_. Like you do, or Dwalin, or like Kili did. It's instinct for you. For me, it was long hours and bloody repetition and perseverence, but I suppose I succeeded. They said I was a good fighter, before all this mess with my head started."

"You still are. Among the clans, Aelon is second best only to my mother, sometimes, and he chose me to fight you in his stead. And when we did, we kept the score even."

"And yet..." Fili toweled her right foot dry and shifted back, pulling from the shaft of his boot the knife he'd been using to cut that boar. He handed it to Tauriel with a wistful smile. "My last one."

She turned it reverently in her hands, despite surely having seen it before as they'd been camping on the road to Enelgalad.

"I thought they took all your knives when the Mirkwood Guard arrested you."

Fili shrugged as he pushed away the bowl of water, briefly wondering where he was supposed to drain it.

"Kili was a pilfering pest, and you never searched him."

Tauriel chuckled. "So he did have something in his trousers..."

Fili grinned. "That he did."

He looked up at her seriously then, still sitting on his heels, with one hand wrapped around her calf because once he'd started he didn't seem able to stop touching her. Another thing he'd have to deal with once he'd slept.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I'm sorry I hurt you, and that I dragged you and your clan into this whole mess. I know it was your choice to come here anyway, and that you say you're a fighter and you're used to all sorts of injuries, but that doesn't make it alright, not for me."

For a long moment Tauriel just held his gaze. Then she took a deep breath and sent him a small, lopsided grin. The following question took him by complete surprise and at the same time felt like some ancient puzzle piece quietly and inevitably clicking into place:

"Is this how you apologize to a girl on Nost-na-Lothion?"

Her eyes were dark in the low lamplight, searching his carefully while her tone strived for teasing. Fili swallowed thickly, a handful of reasons running through his head to remind him why what Tauriel was implying would be irresponsible, stupid, dangerous and impossible.

"Weren't there some traditions your people followed?" he asked nevertheless.

"I drank from your cup, and you drank from mine."

The air between them thickened and pulsed.

Fili blinked, his hand slowly travelling up her calf, his mind trying to recall what they'd been doing with their drinks the whole night, and then realizing with a violent jolt of jealousy what it was that had always bugged him about her and Dwalin.

"The wine and all those games and songs..." he said. "There is a time and place for this for you woodland elves. Gestures and rites, and everything. Symbols and approvals by elders. It's not just... not just a casual arrangement between friends."

"No. It's a bit more than that within the clans."

He pressed a kiss against the inside of her knee and felt her gasp and spread her legs an inch wider. A bit more, hah. It was _a lot_ more for Fili, but feeling she'd just invited him to share with her something deep and old, a night filled with wine, legends and honeyed bloom, and she deserved to enjoy it, all of it and more, and who knows when she'd get to be back home for Nost-na-Lothion again... 

He wanted it. He wanted her.

"But your mother..." he still tried. "She was angry with you, and she called you something... Gond. What does it mean, won't you get in some kind of trouble with her?"

Tauriel huffed. "Can we not talk about my mother?"

She reached out to card her fingers through his hair, trying to distract him, and Fili barely swallowed an embarrassing groan of pleasure. Mahal, how little he needed. He shifted closer and ran his hands up her slender legs, rucking up her green dress to then leave a soft trail of kisses on the inside of her thigh, hoping to tease the truth from her anyway.

"It's really you we're talking about, aren't we?"

"And why _are_ we still talking?" Tauriel closed her eyes, her breathing growing heavy. She bit her lip, and Fili switched languidly to her other thigh, half-drunk on the woodsmoke caught in her dress, the warmth of her and the faint sheen of sweat on her skin. He was already half-hard in his pants.

"It's my name," she admitted with a hitched breath, her hands sinking deeper in his hair, messing up his braids. "Denwechiel is my first, my father-name. Gondgwaloth... the name my mother gave me. 'Flowering rock', or 'Blossom of the stones', make your pick, it's weird and sounds... sounds ugly and makes no sense anyway."

"And Tauriel?"

"The name I chose myself... the moment I was old enough to do so."

"Gondgwaloth," Fili tested the name on his tongue.

Tauriel went still beneath his lips and touch.

"Say it again," she whispered.

Fili looked up to meet her darkened gaze, her cheeks flushed in the low amber light. 

"Gondgwaloth," he said.

She opened and then closed her mouth, for some reason lost for words. "How did...?" she choked out, then leaned forward, cupping his jaw and pressing a soft kiss on his forehead, some bitter shadow and an incredulous wonder warring in her eyes.

"You pronounce it like it's in Khuzdul," she said. "Like it belongs with mountains and windswept rocks, and dark hallways hewn in stone. You pronounce it like it makes sense."

Fili reached up to burrow his hands in her hair, their faces so close they were breathing the same air, heavy with the honeyed fragrance of the night.

"Stone blossom. You," he said. "The white _taurloth_ of Mirkwood gracing my halls of stone. Of course it makes sense."

He pressed his lips to hers and lost sense of time in a completely different fashion.

Next he knew, she was kissing him back fervently, and he was pushing her down on the bed and swallowing her soft moans as his hands ran through her long copper tresses. Her impatient fingers tugged and pushed under his shirt, small but strong hands of a warrior, caressing his sides and then running up his chest when he quickly toed off his boots and straddled her taller frame. She broke the kiss to pull off his tunic and then wrapped her hands around the sides of his neck, pulling him closer, slid them over his inked shoulders, her breath hitching as Fili pressed his forehead to hers, as he wondered vaguely what in the nameless void he was doing.

So in his confusion he kissed her again.

"I need to see it, Fili," she murmured. "I need to see it."

He didn't understand, so Tauriel pushed him to lie on his stomach, to sink into the silky furs while she sat across his hips and leaned over him, warm, slender fingers lightly tracing the inked lines on his back, and Fili _groaned_, squeezing his eyes shut; even that small touch feeling so raw after nearly half a year of self-imposed detachment. Tauriel muttered something and shifted, and Fili glimpsed the green dress with its brown sash land in a bunched heap on the floor.

And then she bent down and covered his back in kisses, puffs of her warm breath sending mind-bending shivers down his spine, silky hair trailing over his ribs, hands wrapping firmly around his shoulders, and fuck, somehow no one had _ever_ touched him like that, and he wanted to howl and cry simultaneously. He moaned into the furs as she pushed his hair to the side and placed a wide, wet kiss over his scarred shoulder, traced her tongue across his back, and lightly bit his other shoulder. He could feel her hardened nipples pressing against his skin, so she'd been naked under that damn dress _the whole night_, and Fili cursed, realising he'd never been harder.

"Tauriel," he groaned, pushing up on his elbows and flipping around to the glorious sight of her sitting astride his hips, pale skin painted amber by the low lantern, gleaming against the dark background. She gasped as she felt his cock straining against her in his trousers, and rocked her hips unthinkingly even as her eyes seemed unable to stop drinking him in. Fili grabbed her hips to hold her still, and he too could not tear his eyes from her.

And worst of all, it was more than just a stunning sum total result of smooth skin and fiery hair, half-lidded hazel eyes and the most perfect combination of small, round, heaving breasts, slim waist and strong thighs. It was _her_.

"Tauriel. Stoneblossom," he whispered barely audible into the honeyed night. Some old shadow crashed apart in her eyes, and Fili didn't waste time rolling them around, kissing her hungrily as he supported himself on one elbow by her side and then laved a trail down her throat and clavicle, palming her breast and enjoying her breathless whimpers and the arch of her spine as she pressed against his rough palm when he brushed his thumb over her taut nipple. 

His hand glided lower, wrapping around that soft dip above her hipbone, mindful not to put pressure on her bruised right side, catching himself at a thought that an entire week would not be enough to kiss every inch of her skin to his heart's content. He left tender kisses down her chest and on her stomach along the edge of her ribs, growling as she bucked and whined when he took her other nipple in his mouth and laved it with his tongue.

His hand found her dripping wet—and moaning loudly when his fingers slipped along her folds—and he wondered how long she had been so deliciously soaked—fuck, had she really been _naked_ under that dress all night?—when she sparred with him? when she danced?—and was it wine, or was it him, or was it maybe a thought of someone else she had glimpsed during the night, an old love perhaps, or a friend?

"Fili," she moaned softly, scattering his stupid thoughts to the winds.

"Fili, please!"

She spread her knees more, and Fili found he was the perfect size to comfortably kiss and tease her pebbled nipples while pressing a thick finger inside her, the knuckle of his thumb brushing over her clit. She let out a choked whimper as she arched her spine and threw back her head, hands running helplessly through her own disheveled, silky hair that now spilled like a forest fire over the edge of the bed.

Mahal, if only she could see herself. Fili swore, scooting lower and wrapping his arm around her waist to hold her firmly, placing hot kisses on her stomach as he pumped his hand inside her, adding a second and then a third finger, pleasuring her, tearing raw, helpless moans from her, closing his eyes and wishing life was just a little bit simpler. He'd spend hours kissing her wrists and the backs of her knees, and her spine, and her pointy ears. He'd eat her out until she's a mewling, babbling mess. He'd take her and see her come apart on his cock, drunk on wine and the night and each other.

"Fili, please," she begged, her voice ragged. "Please, _tolen cared_, I need you..."

But life was not simple and he couldn't. Thorin had driven that lesson home years ago, to fucking take care where a crown prince puts his dick, and since then it had somehow morphed into something much more meaningful than it was for others; he didn't usually envy them their fun, but he himself, he-

"Fili..." Her hands tugged at his hair, pulling him up for a breathless kiss, her hot tongue carressing his, short nails pressing into his shoulder blades.

"I can't, Tauriel..." he gasped against her lips.

"No, stop it! Stop that nonsense. Forget duty, just for tonight... _Rhach_, do what you want!"

"No, but what if.. what if I get you pregnant..."

She growled, hands cupping his jaw, running over his slightly outgrown beard and down his chest, then she closed her eyes and forced herself to take a deep breath, seemingly pulling together, for his sake, the last shreds of her patience.

"It is not possible," she enunciated. "I've _made_ it not possible; there are ways—completely safe, completely sure woodland ways, trust me on that."

Fili held her gaze for a long moment. Then he softly kissed her brow, fingers reaching to trace the edge of her pointed ear, eliciting a trembling moan from her. He shifted to push off his trousers, settling in between her long, slender legs, palming his aching cock and stroking it a few times, praying he didn't finish right then and there.

Because the only thing he knew right then was that if he ever was going to have a family of his own, it would be with the woodland elf lying flushed and frustrated in front of him. If he ever was going to have children, then, possible or impossible, they would be hers. It might be a pipe dream, a fanciful image scried in flames of an elven bonfire that he had no intention to ever pursue, but still.

He lined himself up and pushed inside her in one long, slow thrust, stretching her, gasping as she enveloped him. She keened, arching her back, and that was it, he was lost completely, the reality narrowing down to just the two of them as he started thrusting into her with abandon.

She wrapped her legs around his waist and never broke her gaze, pupils blown wide with desire and some unnamed emotion that left him speechless, that left him aching and terrified and, at the moment, so absolutely helpless, wrapped up in her strangled whimpers and soft groans, wandering tender hands on his back and slender legs pulling him in deeper, faster, _more_; and he kept plunging into her, wrapped his arms around her; sloppy kisses against her chest and thoughts of elf-bloodied children, and he couldn't, he _couldn't _give her this _more, _but she was clawing at his heart to take it from him anyway.

She crested with a silent scream, arching and collapsing in his embrace like a wave breaking against a shore, bucking her hips against his like the sea lapping white foam at the rocks, hot and slick and clenching down on him in her release, open elation on her face as she rode out her climax, and he didn't, he couldn't last, he spilled inside her with a choked cry, thrusting a few more times and then slumping against her—overwhelmed and undone, and raw, and lost.

He pressed his cheek against her chest and squeezed his eyes shut. He was shaking, panting as if he'd run all the way from Erebor. Tauriel's hands lay limp against his hair as she tried to catch her breath, legs still wrapped loosely around his. Something tremulous was in the air, and Fili couldn't take it any more. He briefly pressed his brow over Tauriel's heart and then forced himself to move off her, to push himself up in a sitting position. Pulling away from her felt like the hardest thing he'd ever done.

He could feel her gaze on his back. Somehow, despite the unchanging darkness of Mirkwood, he could also feel that the morning was near, with its unanswered questions and harsh realities.

"When you said..." Her voice was barely above a whisper. She swallowed, clearing her throat and then tried again. "When you said you couldn't... Why?"

Fili picked up his pants from the floor and, with heavy limbs, started to pull them on. A nameless dread was growing in his chest.

"I meant I won't have children," he said quietly, pulling the pants up and stepping away from the bed to get his tunic lying similarly on the floor. "It started as Thorin's caution against any illegitimate love affairs, but after... After, I decided it's better if the line ends with me."

"But... I _saw_ you with those children tonight. You're kind, you're patient... You'd be a wonderful father..." Her voice was shaking. Fili located his boots and put them on, fingers clumsy with the many buckles. His heart was racing, towards what felt like some black abyss. Her voice stopped him by the door.

"Why are you doing this to yourself?!"

He'd been ready to leave, to flee the house and then try and pull himself together, but when he heard those notes of confused fury crop up in her voice, he couldn't help but finally turn around and face her. His chest tightened further, because holy Mahal was she brilliant, her skin sweaty and flushed against the dark furs on the bed, her lips swollen with kisses and burnished copper tresses a dishevelled mess, her long limbs lean and strong; the faithful, righteous fire in her eyes already so familiar to him, so indispensable. Fili swallowed thickly, his hand stilled on the handle.

"Because people close to me die," he whispered.

Closing the door softly behind him, Fili walked through the house and clambered down the stair, miraculously avoiding all the missing steps. A few feet from the ground he sat down heavily on a step and buried his face in his palms.

What had he done?


	13. A Rainy Morning

Rain was pattering quietly on the roof, dripping through the branches above and muting the honeyed fragrance of _galaspenna_ bloom. 

For once, she woke slowly, grinning and stretching languidly like a cat, luxuriating in the rich, relaxed sensation of having been loved well the night before. The familiar scent of sweetflag roots wafted from her bedsheets, mixing with the woodsmoke in her hair and the wet, fresh air of a spring shower. The old stair would be slippery, the ground muddy. Her mother should have moved all her washing in from the terrace while she still had time before the celebration.

The celebration... Tauriel's eyes snapped open at the memory of how her night had ended. A soft click of a door and then... then a wounded, aching silence. There had been nothing she could do, except lie on her bed and think of his parting words, think of the look on Fili's face as he'd left. In the end, she'd found the energy to just clean herself up a bit and then she'd fallen into a dreamless sleep.

Now she sat up slowly, pulled up the blanket to her chest and hugged her knees. Her thoughts meandered back to Fili kneeling between her legs, his firm, gentle grasp on her calves and ankles. He—the damn King Under the Mountain—had washed her feet so casually. No lover ever had washed her tired feet at the end of a long day.

She'd been laid bare by all the revelations, so turned on by his nearness and his touch. The fire had been slowly gaining power from the small brushes of their fingers as she'd passed him his drinks, to the light pressure of his palm against the small of her back, to the sure grip under her ribs as she'd lain breathless on the ground. And then he'd washed her feet and then kissed her thigh, and she'd been done for. Hearing him share with her his fears and memories had been... unsettling. Like diving into a starlit lake and realizing there is an entire _world_ underneath the magnificent surface, and at the same time realizing just how much of the reflection is just an illusion.

She wasn't sure she had been meant to see it. 

Tauriel closed her eyes as she leaned back her head against the cast-iron bedframe. It had probably been the alcohol, or the very long and eventful day. Nevertheless, her lips curled with wistful amusement as she imagined Fili working in a simple smithy, yellow hair shining through the smoke and the soot. A smith made buckles, hooks and latches, not just knives and swords. A smith's work held a village together. Perhaps Fili had not left smithing that far behind, after all, as he now forged links between Erebor, Dale, and the Woodland Realm. 

How different their lives could be if he'd stayed a smith of the Blue Mountains, a lord in nothing but name.

But he'd crossed half the world, and become king, and then last night he'd... Her lips formed syllables of that weird name her mother had bestowed on her. It wasn't really a Sindarin name, and it sounded harsh and unwieldy in Nandorin too. But somehow, when pronounced with Khuzdul inflection...

The memory made something tighten in her chest.

She liked it when people called her Tauriel. If they knew her other names, it showed respect for her preferences, and if they didn't, it still showed respect. Dwalin never called her Grasshopper in front of her scouts. Nori usually didn't call her Missy in front of others either. Same as her dad didn't call her Taurloth outside of the family. But the way Fili had looked at her when he'd called her Stoneblossom, golden hair and fair skin against the dark wolf pelts of her bed she'd never invited any lover to, his eyes dark and full of awe and desire...

Tauriel took a measured breath and then shook her head. She should forget that look.

She suspected that she never would.

As to how it had all ended... Eru have mercy.

She couldn't think of anything she should have done differently. There had been no fault on her side. At most, she'd disregarded her mother's warning and was now tasting the bitter fruits of disobeying an elder. Mother had said they were not ready for each other, and, if she was being completely honest, Tauriel _did_ have a tiny, secret inkling what her mother had meant, and she refused to even contemplate it.

The bottom line was, messing around with Fili had been a mistake. It had been too much, and now she was left with the fallout.

With memories of supple, warm skin begging for a golden tan. With knowledge of his weight above her, and his ink, his hot mouth, his moustache beads against her cheeks as he'd kissed her, and his quiet moans as she'd touched him, attempting to express with her hands, her lips, her body something she would never even dare to try and shape into words. With the ghost sensation of her fingers buried in his thick hair. With the grace and raw power with which he'd moved inside her, so strong and beautiful, taking her apart with powerful thrusts and then holding her through her flight, her daze, the deepest contentment she'd ever felt—before allowing her a glimpse of the pain in his heart that had left her so wrecked and helpless.

Tauriel cursed, lengthily and creatively and _with feeling_.

What do you say to a person who fucks you like it _means something_, and then declares he's decided to end his bloodline?

How do you argue with that, when you're just... Just who exactly? His Captain of the Scouts? His banished woodland charity case? His hot-bloodied, reckless sword-sister, caught up in a festival not even celebrated by his kind?

_Did_ it mean something? Did she want it to mean something?

Tauriel squeezed her eyes shut and clutched at her hair. No. No, she definitely didn't. She was in a deep enough mess as it was, to even start contemplating that possibility. If this was what she got for ignoring an elder's advice on Nost-na-Lothion, then she'd deal with it, but there was no need to make it any worse. Facing Fili was going to be difficult as it was. She didn't think he was upset with her specifically, more probably with the whole issue of family and loss as such, so maybe they could just ignore what happened and go back to being friends, or whoever she was to him.

After a long steadying breath, she forced herself to get a grip and get up, then wrapped herself in a bedsheet and went in search of her regular clothes. The floors creaked beneath her bare feet, but her parents' bedroom door remained closed. She thought she'd heard them return only a few hours before. 

The old laundry room was missing a good chunk of the floor. Tauriel found her things on a clothesline in her father's workshop instead, amid drying bedlinens and shirts that almost obscured his massive loom, waiting for all the details to be repaired.

She returned to her room, braided her hair and dressed. The elves would start to stir only around midday, but she wasn't sure about the dwarves. Fili was a heavy sleeper, but if he'd decided to not wait for Aelon's answer or the promised help of the Danarim, then they might be preparing to leave already.

She leaned out the window to check the situation below. It was still drizzling and cold. Nothing seemed to be moving among the trees or on the side of the dwarven lodgings, so she brought a few more lanterns into her room, found Fili's whetstone in her pouch (again), found Fili's knife gleaming from under a chair (that was a first), sat cross-legged on her bed and started sharpening their swords he'd left lying on the floor. She needed to think about the road ahead.

When she was done, she went to get rid of the sudsy water still left in the bowl in the corner, discovered that the wooden drain pipe in the kitchen still worked despite the rusted fittings, as did the block and tackle for bringing up fresh water from the ground. She stared at the mechanism for a while, biting her nail, thinking. Then found two spare pulleys and re-threaded the rope to make it a double tackle, like the dwarves used in Erebor for hauling water and stone. She might not understand the principles behind it, but somehow a double pulley made the load a lot easier to pull up.

Then she put on a cloak and went down into the rain, filled a few buckets from a nearby well, then climbed back up and pulled up the water. Her mother kept some buckets in the kitchen at all times. The dishes seemed to be done, as was the laundry. Tauriel frowned, thinking what else she could busy herself with, in order to avoid thinking about... Right. Perhaps she should go outside and start sorting out the leftovers and the soggy furs and pillows left around the fires.

She startled when somebody rang the bell rope that led down along the trunk. 

"Good morning, Tauriel!" somebody greeted her when she leaned out the kitchen window. The elf raised her lantern, and Tauriel recognized elder Limeth of the Almarim. "I am very sorry, but there is need for your parents. I'm afraid it cannot wait."

"What is it?" she asked, her first thoughts turning to Fili again. "Has something happened to the dwarves?"

"No, nothing like that! It's an internal matter of the Almarim. But we'd appreciate your parents' thoughts nevertheless."

Tauriel sighed with relief and went to wake them up, like she'd done a hundred times when she'd still lived in Enelgalad.

Half an hour later though, the entire settlement was stirring—something Tauriel didn't remember ever happening so early after Nost-na-Lothion. Her father had got ready quickly and without a complaint, while Baralinel followed him with some grumbling and deep yawns. They'd both disappeared among the trees to join the council of the elders on the far side of Enelgalad. Tauriel figured she better get going too. Face Fili and get it over with.

With a heavy feeling in the pit of her stomach, Tauriel put on her scalemail shirt, gathered her remaining things and shut the creaky door of her childhood home behind her.

The rain was not heavy, but it still made everything cold and wet. For a moment Tauriel wished she was back in the Mountain, enjoying a crackling fire and Bombur's mushroom soup, her feet in dry woolen socks and lightweight birch and leather clogs that Bifur had made for her. How was it possible to miss something she'd only known for such a short time? Then again, she already missed the sure, warm touch of... Tauriel violently stopped that thought.

Fili was up already, sitting on the steps of their lodgings and gloomily inspecting one of his boots in the flickering light of a torch. He didn't look like he'd slept much, his face drawn and pale, his hair unkempt.

"Hey." When he looked up, Tauriel tossed him his knife, and something relaxed in his expression.

"Hey."

She leaned against the doorframe, fitting herself under the eaves of the roof. Fili meanwhile put on his boot and slipped the knife into the shaft.

"Are you..." Casting a look inside, she saw that others were slowly waking up and geting ready as well. She bit her lip. What kind of a fool would ask that? _Are you alright._ She knew he wasn't, not by a long shot. Tauriel cleared her throat and glanced away.

"Are we... friends still?" she asked quietly. "After... last night?"

Fili stared somewhere past her. Then he swallowed and nodded, his jaw working nervously and eyes refusing to quite meet Tauriel's.

"Yeah. I'm... I'm sorry I, uh, dumped all that on you. In the end."

Tauriel nodded. A dozen other questions swarmed in her mind, suddenly loud and sharp-edged, and demanding. Was the ending all he was sorry for? Or did he maybe regret the whole thing? What if she had not pestered him with those questions at the end? Would it have changed something? (Did she want it to have changed something?) And now they were... friends...still? So he had considered them friends before? She knew she counted him as hers, but she hadn't known he did. And what did he actually expect from a friend?

Everything felt so brittle between them, and she was afraid to ask, afraid to dive into his heart again. Maybe she wasn't sure what she would do with the answers, should she ever get them. Or maybe she'd decide to dive deeper and deeper, until she was lost for good.

"Do you know what's going on there?'' Fili waved towards the trees, but Tauriel could only shake her head.

"Could they be discussing whether to help us?"

Tauriel slowly shook her head again. She crossed her arms, staring off into the trees. "That decision is in Aelon's hands now."

Fili nodded, and Tauriel wanted to scream. There was only so much sighing and nodding she could take in a morning. Especially this morning. Especially from Fili.

"Hey, look who's up early." Nori suddenly poked his head out the door. "Sorry for interrupting. Bofur and I need to speak with you."

“So, uh, we did it, while you were gone last night,” Nori said when Fili had sighed again, grabbed his cloak and together with Tauriel followed the two aside into the drizzling rain.

Fili stared at him. “Did what?”

“Hid the you-know-what.”

“The you-know…” A muscle twitched in Fili's jaw. Tauriel just watched the dwarves, a confused line growing between her brows. Fili swore under his breath.

“Where is it?”

Nori blinked. “We hid it in that old well. The one where we found the towels.”

“Yeah, turned out, that pile of rubble used to be a well,” Bofur explained, sounding rather pleased with himself. “The shaft underneath has remained somewhat intact, but we figured it’s so far out of everyone’s way, and if they haven’t repaired it by now, then they won’t be going near it for a while yet… Nobody will think to look there.”

At the mention of the towels Tauriel had to take a deep, calming breath. “What… did you hide in that well?” she asked.

Nori and Bofur exchanged a glance. “The Spiderking’s precious jewelry, of course.”

“Exactly, the entire box.”

Fili pinched the bridge of his nose. “Did you check it?”

Bofur shrugged. “No need, the latch is secure and hard to tamper with. The gems are safe.”

“You buried the whole box unopened? The silver filigree box?”

“Well, yes.” Nori was watching him with a suspicious frown, and it seemed like Fili was forcing his shoulders to relax.

“Alright.” He exhaled. “Alright. And nobody saw you?”

Bofur beamed. “No. Everyone was too busy frolicking.”

“Any other things in my pack that you pawed through?”

“Just as messy as you left them. We just took the box.”

Fili sighed, letting the last of the tension bleed from his shoulders. 

"Could you... explain?" Tauriel spoke up.

"Well, we'd been thinking." Bofur grinned. "No use bringing precious jewelry into a spider-infested forest. Could be useful later. As leverage or something."

"Or," Fili stressed, meeting Tauriel's gaze properly for the first time that morning, "as a simple sign of good faith. It's worth more to him than to us."

Tauriel frowned. Something didn't feel quite right, but, again, she was unsure where to even start asking. Feeling Fili's intense gaze on her, she just nodded curtly.

Fili turned to go back to the shed, then squinted through the rain. Tauriel straightened up too when she noticed her mother and Master Aelon coming their way. Baralinel, in her morning haste, had thrown on the same dress from yesterday, the hem now heavy with the rain and the mud. Aelon didn't look like he'd slept at all. 

"Good morning, dwarves and Tauriel," Aelon drawled with a lazy smirk. Gloin and Dori had poked their heads through the door as well. "I have good news and slightly less good news."

Baralinel stopped a few steps behind him, arms crossed in displeasure over her chest. "Save us your speeches, Aelon."

"As the lady wishes." The elf shrugged, dug into a pocket and presented Fili with a closed fist. Before even Tauriel could open her mouth, Fili rolled his shoulders and stretched out his hand, letting the Alma fill it with a few dried plums and nuts, slightly mixed with ash and soot. 

"The bowl fell over at some point," he said in a not-quite-apology. 

Fili watched him, closing his hand around the fruit. "You said you wanted to see our people dance together, before you help. We didn't. So is this," Fili waved his fist, "your full agreement, or are there still some conditions left?"

"It's my full support, Fili Favrion. I did see a most inspiring dance." Aelon shot a quick grin at him and Tauriel.

With her arms crossed, Tauriel lightly brushed her side where a bruise bloomed under her ribs. At least something had come from that spar.

"So, those are the good news, Master Aelon," she prompted him. "What else?"

Baralinel cleared her throat and took a step forward. "The other news is that we ask you to leave as soon as possible. Eat first, and then set out, say, in an hour. I will lead the Danarim to join you in a few hours, we will be bringing more provisions for everyone. And Aelon with his hunters will join us before nightfall."

Tauriel frowned. "What is going on, mother?"

"I cannot tell you right now." Baralinel shot a glare at Aelon, who was grinning again. "It is a personal matter."

"Don't worry," Aelon nodded at Fili. "You can count on me and mine."

They left, Baralinel muttering something under her breath as she stalked towards her home, and Aelon sauntered in the opposite direction, calling out instructions to someone to start organizing a breakfast for the company. 

"Well," Nori said. 

"Yeah," Bofur agreed.

Fili popped a plum in his mouth as he watched after Aelon, curiosity and relief warring on his face.

Tauriel was mostly just relieved that the Almarim were coming and that soon she'd be out on the road again. 

Sighs, nods and avoided gazes feel less awkward when you're busy walking.


End file.
